


Our Stars Scattered Like Dust

by icedteainthebag



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-27
Updated: 2012-10-27
Packaged: 2017-11-17 04:33:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 33,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/547659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icedteainthebag/pseuds/icedteainthebag
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As the new bartender on the cruise ship <i>Galactica</i> Bill Adama is hoping for an uneventful first voyage, but his life is irrevocably changed when he meets cruise director Laura Roslin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Our Stars Scattered Like Dust

**Author's Note:**

> Co-written with wishflsinfl. Thanks to somadanne and fragrantwoods for beta reading.

"Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing, only a signal shown, and a distant voice in the darkness; So on the ocean of life we pass and speak one another, only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence."  
 _— Longfellow_

*

DAY ONE: Leaving L.A.

The sun was hot, the winds were high, and Laura Roslin was ready to get this party started.

"Is everybody havin' a good time this afternoon?" Laura paused as she listened to a few lackluster cheers from the surrounding pool area. She moved the mic closer to her lips and flashed a brilliant smile, putting her hand on her hip. "I said, is everybody havin' a good time this afternoon?!"

The ruckus grew louder, a few passersby stopping to raise their hands in the air and cheer. It wasn't the best response she'd ever had but she'd take it. It _was_ only 2:00 p.m.

"That's better." She tossed her hair over her shoulder. "I'm Laura Roslin and I'm your cruise director aboard _Galactica_. I've been in the cruise industry for fourteen _titillating_ years …"

A few men let out wolf howls.

"And you know what they say about experience!"

"What do they say?!" a drunk, shirtless guy yelled from the pool.

"If you don't know, I'm not gonna tell you." She let the audience laugh and continued, "I'm here to formally welcome you and tell you what a good time you're going to have over the next seven days. Why? Because I'm in charge of your good time!"

The cheers were nearly deafening. She felt the adrenaline rush bring a blush to her cheeks. Gods, she would miss this. Frak mandatory retirement age. She was still the best cruise director in the Western hemisphere.

"We love you Laura!" a man hollered from the back.

"If you love me, then you'll _love_ our next activity on the Lido deck … _The All Aboard Scavenger Hunt_!"

 _The frakkin' scavenger hunt_ , she thought, trying not to roll her eyes. She checked her watch; she was never truly off duty on the ship, but her self-imposed day-of-embarkation drinking restrictions eased up after 8:00 p.m.

Five more hours.

Laura turned to her new assistant, Tory Foster. She hadn't thought she needed an assistant to begin with—it had been upon the insistence of the captain that she took her on. Tory hadn't done much of anything all day, and Laura didn't feel like putting in the effort to create something for her to do.

"Can you go back and put the finishing touches on tomorrow's activity calendar? Add a One-Legged Keg Stand or something. Five dollar entry fee. We've got a lot of college kids."

Laura couldn't read Tory's expression behind her huge dark sunglasses. "No problem, ma'am."

Gods, she was getting old.

*

Gaius Baltar, dressed in his finest white Panama suit, listened to his boss work through her scavenger hunt introduction and groaned inwardly. 

"It can't be that bad," said a voice beside him. 

He jumped a little, startled to discover that the voice belonged to a tall, well-dressed blonde. "I'm sorry, did I—I didn't mean to—" 

She smiled enigmatically. "Don't worry, it'll be our little secret."

Gaius glanced at Laura and was relieved to see that whatever he'd done to attract the blonde's attention, Laura hadn't noticed. He shuddered to think how many weeks of bingo calling she'd sentence him to for undermining her big welcome speech. Then he remembered this was her final tour as cruise director on _Galactica_ and felt a twinge of sadness. 

Turning his attention back to the blonde in the tight red dress he said, "Gaius Baltar, Associate Cruise Director, at your service."

"Gaius Baltar," she said, pressing a hand to her chest. " _The_ Gaius Baltar, as in Gaius Baltar, Love Doctor?"

"Why yes! You've heard my radio program?" Few people had, really. Hence the abrupt cancellation after six months in syndication.

"Heard it? I'm your biggest fan. I can't tell you how many nights I fell asleep to the sound of your voice."

" _Really?_ Well, I must say, I'm flattered." He raked a hand through his hair, letting it fall back into the messy style he effected for his promotional photos. "And you are?"

"Caprica."

"What a truly lovely and unusual name."

_To go with a truly lovely and unusual body._

She leaned in closer, a hand on his arm. "Do you think you could help me out with this scavenger hunt? The list is so long and I have no idea where some of these places are."

Gaius feigned interest in the list of things they'd need to find, though he knew it by heart. A casino chip. A drink stirrer. A photo of the lucky scavenger sitting at the captain's table in the main dining room. A cup of pool water. The name of a bridge crewman. 

The passengers thought it was great fun, when in fact it was Laura's way of getting them to learn the layout of the ship and all it had to offer. Why else would she offer up most of her staff to team up with the hapless passengers as they scampered around, collecting their treasures?

Laura was wrapping up her speech now, asking everyone to find at least one other passenger or staff member so they could begin. 

Gaius took Caprica's hand in his, raising it high above their heads to signify that they'd made a match. One woman waved back with an odd expression on her face.

As they awaited the starting whistle, Caprica leaned and whispered, "We're going to have so much fun together."

*

In the deserted crew bar, Bill Adama thumbed through his _Bartender's Bible_ , mentally reviewing some of the more obscure drinks. He'd made everything in the book dozens of times in practice, but this was his first real gig and he was a little nervous. At least they were breaking him in easy. From what he'd heard, he wouldn't see much action until the first shift knocked off later this afternoon. 

The door to the bar swung open and in walked the captain. 

Bill had known Ellen Tigh forever. They'd met in Russia, back before the Iron Curtain fell. She'd been smuggling small arms up the Volga, and he'd been assigned to expedite the final transfer. They'd worked for the same side—most of the time. After that first successful mission, she'd run merchandise for him through some of the roughest waters in the world. The Red Sea. The Gulf of Aden. The Strait of Malacca. They were an on-again, off-again team right up until the Eickman Affair ran Ellen out of the business and got Bill assigned to a listening post in Outer Mongolia.

Ellen took a seat at the bar. "Think you can handle a shot of bourbon neat?"

Bill eyed her warily. "You know it's against regs for me to serve you while you're on duty."

"Really, Bill, since when did the rules apply to us?" Using her index finger, she pushed the glass closer to him. "Pour."

He grabbed the bottle of Jim Beam by the neck and measured out a generous shot. There was no doubt in his mind that she could pilot this tub while she was buzzed. Or that she'd sack him before they put in at their first port if he pissed her off. 

And one thing was certain: he needed this job like a fish needed water.

She threw the shot back. "You met anybody yet?"

"Not yet." Bill eyed her empty shot glass and she tapped it on the table, so he poured another. "Not a lot of drinkers on this ship?"

"Some are," Ellen said, raising her glass to him. "Some aren't." She drained her glass again. "You'll figure out who's who soon enough."

She reluctantly pushed the shot glass toward him and he swept it up into his palm before she could change her mind. Turning his back to her, he stacked the glass in the dish rack. "I wanted to thank you again for getting me this job."

"Bill, it was the least I could do."

This stirred something in him, something he knew was better left unsaid. He nodded, busying himself with lining up the bottles on the shelf until he heard the door swing shut behind her.

*

Bill had three shifts during the day, each a few hours long. It was a pretty shitty schedule for a man of his age. And the worst part about it was that he was surrounded by an astounding variety of the world's finest liquors and he wasn't allowed to drink.

He wiped down the bar, readying it for closing time. Five minutes until his afternoon shift was over. He tossed the rag into the slop sink and fished in his pocket for his pill bottle. It was early but he'd been watching the clock for the last forty-five minutes. 

He was screwing the lid back on the small orange bottle when the door to the bar swung open and in walked a blonde in a bridge uniform.

Unable to wait any longer, Bill popped the white capsule into his mouth and dry swallowed. It went down like a slug of lead. 

The blonde swung one leg over a stool. "Whaddya hear?"

"Nothin' but the rain." It came out automatically.

"Huh." She nodded, her smile instantly taking five years off her hardened features. "I like that."

"Picked it up from a buddy in Cambodia. Longest summer of my life. Rained every frakkin' day." Bill set a cocktail napkin in front of her. "What can I get you?"

"Bud Light." She pulled the half-full bowl of peanuts closer and used her teeth to crack into one. "You're new here."

He set her beer on the bar. "Bill Adama."

"Kara Thrace." Her grip was firm when she shook his outstretched hand. "And you don't need to be so squirrely about using. It's pretty common around here."

"Using?"

"Stims." She popped a shelled peanut into her mouth. "I mean, I'm guessing that's what you were choking down when I walked in."

"Oh, uh, yeah. Thanks for the tip."

Kara sipped her beer and watched him stack clean glasses on the shelf behind him. "You might want to work on your small talk if you're planning to do this for a living."

"It's not for a living," he said. "Just to pass the time."

She nodded, taking a longer swig of her beer. She glanced at her watch. "You're outta here in two minutes. Does this need to be gone by then?"

"If you're looking for me to challenge you, I won't."

She chugged the beer anyhow, emptying it at an alarming speed before slamming the bottle down on the bar with a grin. "You play cards? Some of us get together after the last shift most nights. We're always looking for fresh blood." 

Bill cleared her empty bottle. "For an easy mark, you mean?"

"Heard from your son that you're anything but easy, Old Man." Pushing back from the bar, she slapped the wooden counter with both palms. "You need something, let me know. I can hook you up."

She turned on her heel and sauntered out, leaving Bill to wonder what exactly the crew had heard about him. He and Lee hadn't been on the best terms for a few years; he hadn't seen him since he boarded the ship. 

Adamas knew how to hold a grudge.

*

Bill liked dinners by himself. He was used to them. Nothing more awkward than trying to talk and eat at the same time. In the bustling crew dining room, he'd found a solitary space at a table in the corner. He'd have enough time to make friends later; right now he just wanted to enjoy his noodles before he went on his night shift.

Mechanically, he twirled them onto his fork and watched the mostly youthful crew as they frakked around with each other at the tables. He caught sight of that girl again—Kara—learning more about her at this moment than he ever could with her alone at a bar. She really came alive in a crowded room, basking in the limelight. At this moment she was laughing loudly, eyes alight as she spared no effort smacking one of the young, buff shipmen on the arm. 

He felt more lifeless than he'd felt in a very long time. And that was saying something.

His eyes scanned the room, drawn to another corner, where he saw a dark-haired woman bent over her plate. She, too, was sitting alone. Much like him, removed from the action, just a bystander to youth's frivolities.

She looked up, through black-rimmed glasses, and he realized she looked about his age—an unusual event among the mostly twenty-something crew. Slipping a fork into her mouth and staring off into space, she was in her own little world. Perhaps he was intruding, but he felt a longing to see her smile. To be the one who made her smile.

He stabbed at a piece of broccoli and reminded himself why he was here. He was supposed to be taking it easy, one day at a time. And he was supposed to be doing it alone. Keeping to himself. No entanglements. He'd hurt enough people in his life. 

He'd do his job, make a few friends, and get laid when he could. Then, when the time came, he'd disappear into the sunset, just another drifter moving on with no one to miss him when he was gone.

Bill was congratulating himself on how noble that all sounded when the woman with the glasses glanced his way. 

He smiled smoothly, and was thrilled to catch a hint of a smile from her in return. He was feeling pretty good about that when he noticed something furry sliding against the side of his calf. He jumped up, cursing, and a gray and white cat bolted from under his table, on a tear to the next table where he could hear it growling. Several crew members began to laugh, and no one was laughing harder than Kara.

"Bill Adama, meet Lance the cat," Kara hollered from across the room, barely able to speak.

"Isn't that a health code violation?" Bill said, angrily brushing noodle sauce off his shirt with his napkin.

"He belongs to Chef Romo. Or the other way around. And you'd better watch what you say," Kara answered. "Last time somebody pissed off Lance he got a rat tail in his rice."

Bill wasn't sure whether to believe her or not, but even more frustrating was the fact that by the time he looked back at the dark-haired woman's table, she was gone.

*

All through that evening's activities, Laura couldn't stop thinking about the sadness she'd seen in the new bartender's eyes as he gazed at her across the crowded cafeteria. He looked like he could use a friend. 

Not your job, she reminded herself. She had a bad habit of picking up strays, a habit this job had only made worse. Hell, half the people who worked on this boat were running from something and the other half were too caught up in their problems to realize that they ought to be. 

Still, she needed to break the new guy in, so she put on her best Cruise Director smile and slid one hip onto her barstool. No matter how crowded the crew bar got—even on a night like tonight, with everyone looking to party away their first night out of port—no one dared take Laura's stool. 

She flashed the bartender a smile. 

He deposited the beer in his hand in front of Ricky the Jet Ski instructor and made his way over to her. Setting a napkin down on the bar, he asked, "What'll it be?" His voice was low and soothing, a welcome change from bartenders past.

"First night at sea, I always have a Summer Breeze."

"Even in January?"

She raised an eyebrow and gave him her saucy look. "You ever heard of a Winter Breeze?"

He rapped twice on the bar. "Summer Breeze it is."

"And hey—" she said as he turned to grab a glass from the rack. "Easy on the fruit juice."

"The lady likes her cocktails strong. I'll keep that in mind."

His smooth words almost distracted her from the awkwardness of his pouring style. Not a bartender by trade. She studied him as he carefully plucked a mint leaf and floated it in the colorful drink. He was about her age, maybe a little older. His face had a lot of years on it, more than it should have. Drugs, she figured. You didn't find many alcoholics tending bar, and compulsive gamblers didn't have the patience for this kind of gig. 

Setting the drink in front of her, he tipped the umbrella at just the right angle.

She took a sip, savoring the warmth of the gin beneath the sweet tang of fruit. "Mmmm. Very nice."

A smile lit his eyes. "Glad you approve." He reached across the bar. "Bill Adama. At your service."

"Any relation to Lee Adama?" It wasn't a very common name but the bartender bore little resemblance to their young stud of a speedboat driver. 

"He's my son." 

"How nice," Laura said, unable to read whether the elder Adama agreed. "I'm Laura Roslin, Cruise Director. But I'm sure you already knew that."

His hand was warm and soft—hard labor wasn't his forte. She settled back as he slipped away to pour another drink, get another beer, try to keep up with the demands of youth's relentless taste for abandon. She let that feeling rush over her just as the gin began to work its heated way through her veins—the sounds and sights of the anticipatory promises each new crew makes at the start of a voyage. _This time will be better. I'll meet someone, have some fun, before we start it all over again._

Bartender Bill kept an eye on her drink and it didn't take him long to return to her. 

"Your choice this time," she said, running her finger around the rim of the empty glass. 

"Anything you won't drink?"

She laughed, her broad smile answering his question. 

"All right. If you want me to surprise you, you can't watch me make it," he said. 

"I promise."

"And I don't trust you. Close your eyes."

"Hmm." She did, feeling the slightest hint of a buzz and a yearning for more of this, whatever she was feeling. It wasn't just the alcohol. She knew how that felt and it was a lonesome thrill. This was something more; it made her feel a bit giddy and almost girlish. 

The roar of the crowd got louder with her eyes closed. Glasses clinked, bar stools grated across the floor, and she smelled what could only be an order of Chef Romo's notorious jalapeno poppers arriving from the galley.

"Now, don't open your eyes."

The proximity of his voice startled her. She carefully reached out in front of her and her palm met glass. Her fingers also met the tips of his as he held the drink steady for her, briefly, before letting go. 

She picked it up and brought it to her mouth and got speared in the forehead by a straw.

"Lords, I wasn't expecting that." Laura wrinkled her nose and heard Bill chuckle. "What self-respecting drunk uses a straw?"

"Guess I don't know the habits of the self-respecting drunk." A pause. "It's gone now."

She tilted the glass, then stopped. "If you slip me a mickey, I'll make you walk the plank."

His reply was quick and confident. "I don't need drugs to get laid."

Her tongue flicked out over her lips. "Surely not." 

She took a sip of the drink and was at once surprised and pleased. Only slightly sweet, but heavy on the liquor, of which there were several kinds. "Impressive," she said, taking a longer, more efficient swallow. She opened her eyes to see him leaning over the counter, watching her intently. The flush in her cheeks could be blamed on the alcohol, what little she'd consumed. 

"What's it called?"

"We used to call it a Weng Weng in the service," he said. "If you like it, you can rename it."

Another swallow. "I'll think on it."

He stood up straight when somebody banged a bar glass hard, twice, on the countertop. "You let me know."

Finishing up the drink, she noticed he didn't return to her side of the bar. Kara Thrace and a couple of her harem boys had arrived and she seemed very friendly with Bartender Bill already. 

That was fine; she had all the alcohol she needed in her room. But she'd convinced herself, this cruise, to start every night not drinking alone, even if she ended up that way later in the evening. 

She left a ten-dollar bill under her glass.

*

At quarter past eleven, Bill shrugged on his windbreaker and went to the Caribe Deck at the bow of the ship. The first thing that impressed him was the suck of the door when he opened it to the deck, like the wind was beckoning him into expansive darkness.

This darkness was quiet, quieter than he ever could have expected; he could hear the rush of water as the ship passed by, wave after wave, the gentle rocking of the boat putting him at ease. And here this boat was, pushing forward in the dark, leaving nothing in its wake that wouldn't settle within a few minutes' time. It made him feel small in the world. It made him realize how big the world was. 

And here he was, his ears still ringing from the madness of that tiny barroom, his thoughts still with the people he'd met there. Most seemed friendly, a few dramatic. His mind kept drifting back to meeting that cruise director … Laura. She intrigued him, an excitement with an inlay of fear running just below that surface.

_Does being alone mean being lonely?_

Leaning against the railing, an occasional sea mist speckling his chilling cheeks, he closed his eyes and felt the ship until he felt like he _was_ the ship. An occasional swell made him clutch at the worn, paint-chipped beam, the only thing that separated him from the depths of the sea.

It wouldn't be such a bad way to go, he thought. Falling, being pulled under, being left in the wake, wrapped tightly in the cold, comforting fist of the sea. The idea of choosing his fate … if only. It would be easy and quick. 

He looked down and saw nothing, surrounded by nothing. 

"Is this your favorite place?"

He didn't open his eyes. If he was daydreaming Laura at his side, then so be it. "On this boat, so far … yes."

He felt her close by and heard her hum in response, then a shifting sound of fabric, most likely the rustle of her coat as she tightened it against the wind. "I rarely see another ship on the horizon. Mostly all I see are stars … more than I ever imagined. Never ceases to amaze me."

Opening his eyes, he looked at her slight, dark form beside him. A few bars of light shining through the glass doors behind them were just enough to highlight her profile, face tilted upward. He followed suit.

"When I was a kid I wanted to be an astronaut." He searched the sky for the few constellations he knew. "Maybe more of a space cowboy. With my own spaceship."

"Space cowboy. Would you have fought aliens?"

"Absolutely." He found Taurus in the sky, Orion. "I wanted to protect everyone. Make them feel safe from things I knew didn't even exist."

Her body brushed up against his and she grabbed his arm. She seemed a bit unsteady and there it was—he caught a whiff of alcohol, not anything he'd served her at the bar, and he'd served her a lot. 

She let out a quick laugh and he instinctively put his arm around her waist.

"So what happened?" she asked.

"Not a lot of job openings for space cowboys."

"Economy's bad nowadays." She didn't pull away from him. A gust of wind flicked the ends of her hair against his cheek. "You're still a protector, though."

He chuckled. "Protector of the bar stock?"

"Mm, no. You're making me feel safe."

"You're very trusting of a stranger in the dark."

"I've encountered my share of strangers in the dark. This doesn't feel so strange."

The boat took another swell, this one driving the bow of the ship downward, making them both gasp and then laugh.

"Maybe you're the protector." Bill couldn't believe he was saying what he was saying; it was like he was the drunk one. "Maybe you stopped me from doing something regrettable tonight."

There was a long enough pause to make Bill wonder if he had ruined any chance he had with this woman. And then wonder where the hell that thought came from.

Her hand slid to the top of his, her palm warm. "Sometimes the person you need the most protection from is yourself."

He was struck by this, by the realization that they might have a lot in common, and it might not all be good.

"I need to get to bed," she said. "Early day tomorrow. 8:00 a.m. Pop Trivia Bingo on the Sunburst Deck." The thick fabric of her jacket couldn't disguise her heaving sigh. "Maybe I'm the one who should be thinking of jumping."

"I wasn't—"

"I know." Squeezing his hand, she pulled away from him. "Enjoy the dark."

It seemed especially lonely after she left.

*

Once the air had turned too chilly and his chest tightened with the threat of a cough, Bill returned to his closet-sized cabin. He knew too much cold air wasn't good for him, and he wasn't feeling particularly self-destructive after his talk with Laura.

Stripping down to his tank top and boxers, he stood in front of his standard-issue crewman's mirror. He could only see down to his waist, but he wasn't sure he wanted to see any more. He lifted his arms, one at a time, examining them and running his fingers down sagging skin that used to be taut with muscle. He shouldn't have quit working out.

He smoothed his fingers over the circles under his eyes—was it the lighting, or were they worse than ever? 

He opened his mouth, yawning, getting a good view of every corner and crevice before he popped open his pill dispenser and tossed down twelve hours' worth of peace of mind.

Then he brushed his teeth until he'd exorcised yet another night's demons.

*

Caprica heard the familiar jingle associated with Cavil on her FaceTime and accepted his call, hoping he wouldn't be lying in bed with one of her sisters as he occasionally did when he called.

"How was your first day at sea?" he asked.

Caprica had never been on a cruise before, but she hadn't had a chance to take it all in today. She'd been more involved with the task she'd been assigned. "I had a mai tai."

"And?" 

She stared coolly back at him. "I planted the tracking device on the bridge."

Cavil's smile widened to acknowledge her accomplishment. "And?"

Caprica felt her cheeks grow hot with indignation and embarrassment. "That's all you need to know."

"Well, whatever—whoever—else you're doing, make sure you enjoy it while you can." 

_I'm so tired of your face._

She hit the End button. She knew it wouldn't be long and she was planning on enjoying Gaius to his fullest extent.

Caprica stood up from her chair, reaching under her skirt to shimmy her underwear down her legs. She stepped out of them delicately, swiping the keycard to Gaius's room off the countertop.

Caprica twirled the keycard between her fingers, small and smooth. Room 383. She might die there one day, but she never feared that.

It was how she knew she wasn't human.

* DAY TWO: At Sea off the California Coast

Day two of Bill's first voyage dawned sunny and warm. Always an early riser, he'd found himself sleeping even less than usual these days. Dressed in khaki shorts and a tropical-print shirt, he blended in with the passengers as he walked the open deck. 

How different the sea looked during the day--deep blue in the sun. His dismal thoughts of the night before were gone, replaced by his recollection of Laura, her hip brushing against his in the darkness. He sipped his coffee and watched a few athletic middle-aged guys straining to make their way up the climbing wall.

The things people did for fun these days. 

His walk took him around the pools and past the driving range, and before he knew it he was standing on the Sunburst Deck, watching Laura lead a group of laughing families in a trivia game. 

"Okay, next question, hands on your buzzers … who is known as The King of Pop?"

She was dressed in a white sundress covered in big bright flowers. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail. Bill liked the way her bare shoulders looked when her hair was up like that. It made him want to kiss the freckles that dotted her skin. 

A cheer went up around the deck, startling him out of his thoughts. 

"That puts the Clownfish ahead by two, but there's still time for the Seagulls to catch up! Because we're about to start the BONUS ROUND where everything is worth DOUBLE POINTS!"

One of her assistants played a quick burst of music and Laura shimmied her hips to the beat as the crowd whooped and hollered. It was hard to believe anyone could get so excited at 8:00 a.m.

Just as her dance was winding down, Laura caught sight of Bill and grinned like she'd been caught red-handed. Shaking her head almost imperceptibly, she winked at him before turning back to the crowd and continuing the game. 

He watched for a few minutes more then left her to enjoy her moment in the spotlight. He had a bar to prep, after all.

*

Lee jogged down the narrow ship's corridors after Kara. "Hey, come on. Wait. Just—"

"No more excuses, Lee," she called back over her shoulder.

"Okay, fine, I'll do it."

She stopped and turned around, hands on her hips, panting a little. Gods he loved it when she was flushed like that. 

"Good." She swept her hand out in front of her. "Lead the way."

He pouted. "Now?"

"No time like the present."

Groaning, he squeezed by her. "I don't see why you care about this so much." So much that she'd threatened to tell the captain about the off-log trips he'd been making in his speedboat at night. 

"Because he's your dad and he seems like a nice guy. You can at least go say hi to him."

He shoved his hands in the pockets of his board shorts. She had no idea what kind of guy his father was. 

"Don't expect him to be happy to see me." He paused at the door to the bar and took a deep breath before pulling it open and stepping inside. 

Kara gave him a little push and he stumbled through the door. 

"Careful there, Adama," said someone seated at a table just inside the door. 

At the sound of his name, Bill's head shot up. He stared at Lee as the foamy head of the beer he'd been pouring flowed over the glass and coated his hand. 

Kara took the lead, striding up to the bar with that swagger Lee loved so much. He followed sullenly. He'd always resented how she could connect with just about anyone and never more than now. 

"Hey Old Man, whaddya hear?" she said sliding onto the barstool. 

"Nothin' but the rain." Bill set a couple of napkins on the bar and then turned his gaze to Lee. "Hi, son."

"Dad."

"It's good to see you."

"You too."

The conversation died there. Lee struggled to come up with something to talk about that wouldn't start an argument. That ruled out his job, his speedboat racing, his brother, the Coast Guard, his mother, whatever the frak his father was doing bartending on the very cruise ship that he'd given Lee hell for signing on to … 

"So, this is nice," Kara said. 

"What can I get you two?" Bill asked, his tight smile failing to conceal how uncomfortable he was. 

"I pulled third watch, so set me up with a couple of pints. Lee?" 

She slapped Lee on his bare shoulder and he wished he'd had time to dress properly before coming down here. He felt childish in his tank top and Hurleys.

"Just a soda for me."

"You on duty?" Bill asked.

"Kind of." 

Lee felt himself blushing. How could he tell his father that he pulled shifts as a lifeguard on days when they were at sea? _Pegasus_ , his supercharged speedboat, only took passengers out when the ship was in port. The rest of the time, one of the Coast Guard's best rescue swimmers spent his days reminding little kids not to run near the pool and policing newlyweds looking for an underwater quickie. 

Lee watched his father retrieve the drinks and wondered for the hundredth time what he was doing working behind a bar. He didn't exactly look like he enjoyed it. In fact, he was moving around behind the bar like every step was a chore. 

Bill set the drinks down in front of them and rested his hands on the bar. "I was gonna come find you once things quieted down. We should talk, son."

Lee fidgeted with his straw, poking at an ice cube. Beneath the bar, Kara nudged him with her knee. He looked up and found Bill staring at him intently, like a man who needed some good news. "Yeah, okay, I'd like that."

"Good." 

Someone down the bar called for the bartender and Bill glanced their way before turning back to Lee one last time. "I'm glad you came by." 

When he was gone, Kara reached down and squeezed Lee's thigh. "See, that wasn't so bad."

Lee watched Bill joking with the crewman he was serving and bit his lip. Something wasn't right and he wasn't sure if he wanted to know what that was. 

*

After each shift, Bill had to restock the bar. It was a bitch of a job, hauling cases of liquor up from stowage, but at least he had a hand truck and an elevator to ease the worst of it.

He was looking for a case of Bombay Sapphire when the door to the storage room opened. 

"Been wondering how long it would be before we ran into each other," Saul said, greeting Bill with a leaning hug. 

"Long time, huh?" Bill clapped Saul on the shoulder once before turning back to his work. 

"I thought Ellen was shitting me when she said she'd taken you on as a bartender."

Bill cracked open the case and pulled out two tall blue bottles and set them on the hand truck. "I thought she was shitting me when she suggested it."

"And here you are." Saul was examining the bottles in Ellen's private stash, the one Bill had been instructed in no uncertain terms never to touch. 

"You cleared to pull from that?" Bill asked, a little nervously. Saul and Ellen's fights were legendary. Bill didn't want the blame for letting Saul get on Ellen's last nerve, as she liked to put it. 

"I won't tell if you won't." Saul winked, uncorking a sixty-year-old bottle of Lagavulin. "Bottoms up." After taking a long slug, he held out the bottle to Bill.

"Nah." Bill waved it off, biting the eraser on his pencil as he tried to remember how many bottles of chardonnay were left in the cooler upstairs. "Can't."

"Right, right. Sorry." Saul took another long pull off the bottle. "How's that going?"

"Fine. Okay." End of story. Thankfully, Saul got the hint. 

"If you're up for some cards, we got a game going most nights."

"Thanks, yeah, Kara told me. Maybe some night this week."

"Okay, then I'll leave you to it." Saul stowed the bottle he'd been drinking from and threw a half-hearted salute before leaving. 

Bill turned back to his list. He'd never quite understood exactly what his relationship with Saul was supposed to be. Buddy? Spouse of a colleague? Wary rival? Ellen sure as hell didn't make it easy on them either, with the way she liked to wind both of them up. 

He sighed. Yet another thing he wasn't going to miss.

*

It was only one in the afternoon and Laura was frakking exhausted. If Gaius asked her one more question about the schedule for the Markham/Vaughn wedding, she was going to push her retirement forward six days and spend the rest of this voyage as a paying customer. 

"Tory has the schedule, Gaius. How many times have we gone over this?"

"But she won't show it to me!"

"Because you're not part of the special event planning team." If it were possible to be having a more inane conversation, Laura didn't want to know what that would involve. She swore he hung around asking questions just so he could hear her voice. Or maybe his own. "How about this? You take the afternoon off and I'll let you lead Disco Karaoke Night tonight."

Gaius stopped pacing and perked up. "Really?"

She never let him lead karaoke nights. Not since that unfortunate incident with the Captain and Tenille look-alikes. But just this once wouldn't hurt. Plus, it would free her up to stop in the bar and see Bill at a reasonable hour. 

The way he'd turned up at her trivia game this morning was a good sign. She needed to move on that before he got distracted by some hot young thing in a bikini.

"Yes, really, now go."

"And the whole afternoon off? Because there is this woman I've been wanting to get to know better …"

Distracted by thoughts of Bill, Laura forgot to remind Gaius of their no-frakking-the-passengers rule. Not like she followed it anyway.

*

There were a handful of people left in the bar finishing up their drinks when Laura slid onto what Bill already thought of as her stool and ordered a drink. 

The second evening was much quieter than the first. Bill assumed that people were already pairing off. Why waste time drinking with your coworkers when you could be below decks frakking one of them?

Bill remembered those days, the urgency of the mission making him horny as hell. A milk run to Puerto Vallarta wasn't exactly a mission, but he figured it felt about the same for these kids.

"Penny for your thoughts," Laura said. 

She'd taken the stirrer from her drink and was sucking on it absently, leading Bill's thoughts in a direction that wouldn't be prudent to share. Yet. 

"Just thinking it's kind of quiet tonight," he offered. 

"Always is on the second night." 

Bill watched a couple leave, arm in arm. "The lucky ones have already paired off, haven't they?"

"And the desperate ones."

He smiled. "Where does that leave us?"

"Old." She rubbed her wrist like it was bothering her. 

Bill wished he had a witty comeback to make her smile, but he couldn't help feeling like he was the oldest soul on this ship. "I'd rather think we're considering our options. Taking our time."

She sipped at the drink he'd put in front of her. "I'd like to hear about these options."

A few more people had filed out. Bill ignored the empty glasses and bits of trash they'd left behind. "Option one," he said, "is the hook-up. I think you know how that one goes. You meet someone, frak like rabbits for seven days and forget their name before you've got two feet on shore."

"Been there. Done that."

He nodded. "Same here. Option two—"

"Barkeep!" 

Bill scowled at the deckhand who'd interrupted him. "Be right back," he said to Laura. 

As he walked down the length of the bar, he could feel Laura's eyes on him. The deckhand wanted Bill to settle a bet with his buddy about which brand of tequila was the best. Bill didn't give a rat's ass, but they'd left him a big tip the night before so he chatted with them for a minute. 

When he glanced back at Laura, she was leaning across the bar reaching for an olive or a cherry or he didn't know what. All he saw was the way the top of her sundress was gaping open to reveal the edge of her lacy dark pink bra.

Then, there was that ponytail … 

Frak option two. He wanted to skip right to the option that involved taking her from behind, his hands on her incredible ass which was at this very moment perfectly positioned for a good hard frakking. 

Laura finally retrieved what she'd been reaching for and sat back down on her barstool. Then she tilted her head back, dangled the cherry above her lips for a moment and sank her teeth into it. 

_Frak me._

"Closing time, boys," Bill said, slapping the bar for emphasis.

"We got ten more minutes—"

"Closing early for maintenance." Bill ignored their protests, eager to get back to Laura. Maybe she needed another cherry. 

Not wanting to look too eager, he forced himself to stop halfway down the bar and deposit some of the empty glasses in the dirty dish bin. He washed his hands and dried them, slowly, like he was in no hurry. 

When he rejoined Laura, she said, "So, about this option two."

He leaned both elbows on the bar, putting himself at eye level with her. "Option two is the slow burn. Romance. Seduction. Flowers. Dinner. Maybe a kiss at the end of the first date but nothing too fast."

"Hmmm." She stirred her drink and Bill swore he saw a look of sadness pass across her face before she replaced it with her professional smile. "I think I'd like to hear option three. Just so I can make an informed decision."

Bill glanced around the bar. It was empty now, the last of the crew gone for the night. Just him and Laura and option three.

"Option three is when you roll the hard six."

She raised an eyebrow. "The hard six? That sounds dirty."

 _You have no idea._ "I doubt you could handle it," he said, drawing a finger through the droplets of liquid condensing on her forgotten drink glass. 

"Try me."

He studied her for a minute, uncertain how far he could take this. It was crazy, the thought she might want him to frak her right here. The thought that she might want him at all. 

But the way she was looking at him, the thing she'd done with the cherry—she had to know he was watching—the way her voice had dropped an octave when she'd said _try me_ … 

She made him feel young again, like he could have any woman he wanted. Right now he wanted her. 

"You sure?"

"Mmmmm."

"Okay." He flipped the hinged part of the bar up and walked around to stand behind her. "Here's the thing about option three," he said, leaning in close to whisper against her hair as he placed his hands on her hips. "Once you choose it, you can't go back. It's irrevocable."

"Irrevocable, hmmm?" She leaned back against his chest and tipped her head to look at him. Turning farther, she touched her lips to his, just barely, just enough for him to feel their soft warmth, before she pulled away. "I'll take my chances."

Bill felt himself starting to harden and knew he had to go lock the door _now_ or it would be an embarrassingly long walk back across the room. 

"Go lock up," Laura whispered. 

"How do you know option three involves locking the door?"

Reaching up, she ran a finger along his jaw, scraping the stubble lightly with her nail. "I think we both know what option three involves, Bill."

Not needing any further encouragement, Bill crossed the room as fast as he could without running. He threw the bolts on the door and quickly reached down to adjust himself before turning back to Laura. 

And nearly had a heart attack at the sight of her.

She was seated on the barstool with both arms stretched out along the bar. One strap of her sundress had fallen down her shoulder, revealing the bra he'd gotten a peek at earlier and just enough bare skin to send his imagination running wild. She'd crossed one leg high over the other and swiveled to the side a little, giving him a view of her legs, from her bare feet all the way up to her incredible ass.

Either her panties were very tiny or she wasn't wearing any. His cock jumped at that thought and suddenly he didn't care how stupid it looked that he was sporting wood as he walked back over to her. Let her see how turned on she was getting him. Let her want him as much as he wanted her. 

She undid her ponytail and shook her head as he approached. "Is this how you roll a hard six?"

He glanced down at the tented front of his pants and then back up at her. "What do you think?"

She moved to uncross her legs as he approached, but he said, "No, stay there."

Standing beside her, on the opposite side of her exposed leg, he put a hand on her knee. "Don't move."

He was close enough to feel her breath on his lips, but he didn't kiss her. Instead, he focused on the green depths of her eyes as he let his palm glide slowly up her thigh. Her breathing increased in time with his, but she held still, letting him explore that single point of contact between them. 

When the tips of his fingers met the chair beneath her hip, he swept them inward to the sensitive skin of her inner thigh and then back down again, coming to rest behind her knee. She gave a little whimper at the stillness of his hand and he felt his heart race in response. 

He'd give anything to hear that sound again. 

He traced the line of her calf as he finally let his lips meet hers. She was cautious at first, nipping at him, teasing him the way his hands were teasing her, sliding under both sides of her skirt now as she shifted on the stool to uncross her legs. 

It felt like they'd done this before, the way she smoothly maneuvered him between her knees and reached for his belt buckle. He dropped his mouth to her neck, tasting her. Frak, he wanted to taste her. 

Ignoring his plan to go slowly and make her want him, he reached beneath her with both hands and hoisted her up onto the bar. 

"Lift up your dress," he said, stepping back to take in the sight of her spread out for him.

"Gods, I love this option," she said, shimmying the skirt up to her waist to reveal a lace thong that matched her bra. She leaned back on the bar and tossed her hair over her shoulders. Bill wondered for a moment if maybe he'd died tonight and gone to heaven. 

He hooked his fingers in the scraps of fabric holding the thong over her hips, pulling it down her legs. He left it dangling from her toe and stood up, kissing her while his fingers explored what her thong had been concealing. Laura broke for breath as his fingers stroked more firmly.

"Like what you've found?" Her voice was but a whisper as her legs squeezed his torso.

"So far." Slipping the tips of two fingers in, he knew he needed more of her. He crouched, hefting one of her legs over his shoulder and pushing her body back against the bar. 

He hadn't wanted something so much in a long time, and he was going to have it tonight.

Her small moans were all he heard as he began lapping at her, far from gentle. Gods, it'd been so long and he didn't remember it tasting quite this good. Her hips began to rock and rose to his mouth when he slipped his tongue inside her.

"Gods, yes. Come on." 

Hearing her plea convinced him that she hadn't had a good frak lately, either. He plunged his tongue deeper, one hand splayed across her hip and ass, holding her near. It was a peculiar angle but he wasn't one to complain. The noises she made began to sound more urgent, more frustrated.

"I can't come this way." Laura grabbed his hair in a fist and tugged it, making him wince. "Frak me. I need you to frak me."

He rose and took instant pride in her flushed face and chest, her wide-eyed desperation. 

"Just making sure you're wet enough." He unzipped his pants, then yanked the fastener free. He pushed down his boxer briefs at the same time. Freedom, sweet freedom as they fell to the floor. 

She drew her finger across his still-wet chin and ran it over his lips. "Am I?"

Bill grabbed her wrist and pushed her hand to his cock, which she immediately encircled, her cool palm holding steady on his nearly painful erection.

"Hard enough?" was all he could manage. The thought of her hot and wet around him was maddening, his arousal quickly rendering him speechless.

"I think …"

With her hand as a guide, he pushed up, trying to slip into her. The frakking countertop was a few inches too high—not what he wanted to deal with during this stint as a bartender-turned-porn star. Laura noticed and wrapped her arm around his neck.

"The barstool."

He supported her hips while she slid down off the bar and settled onto the stool. The height was perfect, his cock naturally at the perfect angle as he stood between her legs. All he had to do was push forward a few inches—and pray the barstool was sturdy enough.

"You sure this will work?"

She glanced around in frustration. "If you have a better idea—"

He didn't—and he didn't want to waste time trying to come up with one. 

Bracing one hand on her hip, he slipped into her, his first thrust gentle as he found his place. Laura kissed him, their eyes open, a glint of a challenge. Time to roll the hard six. No turning back.

She leaned back, elbows on the bar to support her weight, watching the movement of his hips, biting her lip in anticipation. Holding her thighs, he started pounding into her, ignoring the creaking of the barstool beneath her. She seemed surprised at his vigor, crying out and echoing the sound on every downstroke, attempting to wrap her legs around his for leverage. 

She was intoxicating, every part of her, from those soft sounds to her sweet, warm depths. The way she looked at where they were joined like she craved it and then, when she met his eyes, like she wanted so much more than what he was giving her. He felt the swell of arousal within him, willing it with gritted teeth to wait a little longer. But with that rising excitement came something less desirable.

Lightheaded and dizzy, he stopped, buried deep within her. Needing something to steady himself, he bent forward, resting his forehead on her shoulder. "Hold on."

"Did you come?"

Colors were swirling underneath his clenched eyelids. "No. Not yet."

"Okay." He felt her stroking the back of his neck. "Are you okay?"

 _Besides the pangs of nausea …_ "I'll be all right. Got a little dizzy."

She kissed the side of his mouth. "Should I take that as a compliment?"

"Might as well." He caught her lips and kissed her, long and slow, while his body recovered. It was the absolute worst time for this to happen and he wasn't going to let it frak this up.

He thrust into her again, one hard thrust that surprised them both. 

He heard the crack of the wood and was able to get a good hold on her ass an instant before the stool skidded out from under them and clattered to the floor.

"Oh, for frak's sake." Laura clung to him, then slid down his body. The cold chill against his cock was undesirable to say the least. "We broke the godsdamned stool."

"Yeah, I know." Bill kicked it out of the way. "We don't need it."

He pulled her against him and a slight wobble of her legs for a moment gave him the opportunity to turn her around and bend her over the bar, his cock hot against her ass. 

"Apparently not," Laura breathed.

He lightly grabbed a fistful of her hair, grinding his hips against hers. "I'm resourceful."

"You're also a tease."

He leaned over her, yanking down the strap of her dress and her bra to expose her shoulder. He pressed his teeth against her hot skin and watched goose bumps rise.

"Is this … the part …"

"Irrevocable." He shifted himself so his cock slipped through her folds, hitting her clit a few times to draw out her moans. She spread her legs wide, her ass tipped up to him. A few more slow grinds against the curve of her hip and he felt himself slip between her ass cheeks, making her gasp. Hesitation flitted through his mind, competing with this madness she'd driven him to so quickly. He hadn't come prepared for this.

"My purse." 

Oh Gods, he might fall in love with her this very moment if the impression he got was true.

He grabbed her purse from the bar top. He unzipped it and began to look through it, cursing big purses and everything women put in them. "Eucerin cream?" he said, eyeing the tiny tube.

"Different bottle."

He rifled past papers, makeup, so many frakking things until his fingers fumbled upon a tiny clear bottle of Seaman's Choice Lube. He had to laugh.

"Don't laugh, Bill. I'm a woman of distinguished age." She pushed her hips back against him, reminding him of the task at hand. "Sometimes we need a little help."

He popped the cap off. "Seemed fine to me."

She looked back over her shoulder. "Fine?"

"More than fine."

She laughed, turning around again and lazily stretching her arms toward the back of the countertop. "We're talking too much."

His cock twitched in anticipation, enlivened by the throaty sound of her voice and what they were about to do. He slickened it up with his palm, admiring the view she afforded him once again. It'd been a long, long time since he'd done this, and never with a stranger.

But was she a stranger?

Not for long.

He teased her with a lubed fingertip and her tiny moan was instantaneous. All his dizziness was gone; it was now a matter of holding off blowing his load long enough for both of them to enjoy the whole thing. A Herculean task to be sure. For once, Bill was thankful for his age and all those years of experience he had behind him.

One finger slipped in, making slow work of teasing her and relaxing her to the music of her soft whimpers and whispered approval. The volume of alcohol he'd watched her consume was helping, though as much as Laura drank, she never seemed truly drunk.

He was thinking too much again.

Two fingers, in and out, a slow rhythm that her rocking hips matched. With his other hand, he found her clit, and she cried out as he flicked his thumb across it. He watched her fingers curl over the edge of the bar and heard her heavy breaths.

"Yeah?" he whispered.

"Mmhmm."

He replaced his fingers with the head of his cock, nudging at her until she started to squirm. 

"Stop the frakking teasing." The sharpness in her voice took his breath away, but only long enough for him to push gently inside of her, so very slow and easy. The tightness was almost unbearable, but with that pressure came a deep pulse of pleasure he hoped she was feeling, too. She cursed on a low breath and he withdrew, almost entirely, before sliding all the way back in.

More whimpering and a thrust of her hips back into him and it was his turn to curse.

"Frak." Frakking godsdamn motherfrakking holy love of everything holy.

"I'm fine. Just go." Her voice was so soft. He slipped his clean hand around to her front and found her clit again, hot and swollen. Pressing down on it with the pads of his fingers, he massaged it and rocked into her, over and over. Their ragged gasping reminded him that yes, they may be of what she called a distinguished age, but it certainly wasn't keeping them from ass frakking.

Option three was the best option ever. And he'd just made it up a frakking half hour ago.  
Bill again felt his arousal building. "You gonna come?" Because he was gonna come. Very, very soon.

Laura slipped her hand down between her legs and pushed his out of the way. "I can try. Harder."

He did as he was told. She was in some ways his superior, and he loathed insubordination. Her cries got louder, echoing through the bar and for a second he was frightened somebody would hear them, but then he dared fate to make somebody walk in and find him with his dick up the cruise director's ass.

_Frak it._

His mind filled with unspoken words—how hot and tight she was, how sexy she was, how he wanted to frak her until she couldn't walk straight. But the words wouldn't pass his lips, getting caught in his throat with his grunts. Her soft moans heightened in pitch and he felt her tightening around him—enough to cause him to come in a hard rush, deep inside her, dizzying, blissful orgasm. It was never the same by himself.

He stayed in her, holding her hips while she writhed against her own hand, still frantically trying to get herself off.

"So Laura Roslin likes it up the ass," he murmured.

That did it.

She bucked back into him, tossing her head back with a noise that made his entire body tingle. 

He ran his hands up her sides, gently cupping her breasts as she relaxed back into him, sated. He made the slow effort of withdrawing, thoughts of sex slowly fading into thoughts of where his bar towels were.

"Well, if we aren't a health code violation …" Laura breathed, lying limply across the bar.

"I'll tip the serviceman extra." His name was Doral and he always wore these really stupid suits and was kind of a tool, so Bill didn't mind giving him what he deserved. "Do you mind if I—"

"By all means. I'll need something too, please."

Holding his pants up with one hand and feeling kind of silly, Bill went around the back of the bar and rummaged through his drawer for some old towels that looked like they'd seen their last days. This would be their final day. He handed her one, then turned around to give them both privacy as he washed his hands.

It wasn't glamorous work but he'd never found sex all that glamorous.

When he turned back around, Laura had straightened herself out, slid off the bar, and was holding the towel out to him. "Sorry, but—"

"Let's not talk about it and yes." He took her towel, then tossed them both into the trash basket.

They looked at each other over the bar and smiled, then grinned until they laughed off the awkwardness of it all.

"So," Laura said, clearing her throat. She found her ponytail holder where he'd dropped it on the bar and did her hair up again, back in presentable condition. "Option three. Not for the faint of heart."

He chuckled. "No. And not for every day."

"Gods no." Her answer was so immediate that they both laughed again. She put her hand on top of his on the bartop and squeezed it. "I had a fine time."

"A 'fine' time."

An eye roll followed. "It was … intense. Hot. The best in a long time."

He nodded, his ego getting a much-needed boost. "Me too."

Silence followed until she looked at her watch. "Bill, I … I'm not much of the sleepover type—"

"Don't worry about it." Her gentle rejection stung a little, but the truth was he wasn't sure if he could get it up again any time soon. Sleeping next to her would be a dream, but it was probably for the best not to build up those expectations. "We've both got an early morning ahead of us."

"Yeah." Her vision focused to the rack of bottles behind him. "One for the road?"

"Sure. Lady's choice."

Laura licked her lips and he could see her thinking. "Brandy. You too?"

Bill pulled down the bottle and quickly set up two glasses next to each other, pouring even though his hands were shaking a bit from exhaustion that he didn't want to admit. She watched him, then smiled when they picked up their glasses.

"To the _Galactica_ and to … new friends." Laura fumbled a bit with her words.

"To the lube stash in your purse."

Her short laugh broke the tension. "So Say We All."

They each took a sip. Bill knew he shouldn't be drinking, but there were a lot of things this woman had inspired him to do. Just the one time would be fine. 

The silence that surrounded them felt comfortable, like it didn't need to be broken.

Laura finished hers, probably more quickly than she'd normally down brandy. Maybe she was more uncomfortable than he was. "Sleep well, Bill."

With that, she was off, her sundress swishing about her knees—never one for drawing out her goodbyes—and left only a broken stool in her wake.

That was for the best too.

* DAY THREE: West of Baja California

Laura woke up to the sun drifting in through her window. Early morning and the third day at sea. This was when things started to feel really dull, when people stopped showing up for activities as they got used to the ship and had met people to socialize with. The only people left were usually socially awkward or serial frakkers looking for a new plaything for their day.

Her help was less needed from the third day on, yet every day she had to keep showing up, all rah-frakking-rah, from breakfast till dinner.

She fumbled, eyes closed, for her flask on the tiny bookshelf at the head of her bed. She always felt a rush when the cool metal met her fingertips and this morning was no different, especially given the bit of soreness she was feeling in her limbs and other more sensitive areas.

Yeah, she'd gotten into it last night. He'd gotten into her. Whatever the hell happened, this morning brought the predictable uncertainty of sexual aftermath. What did you say to a guy you barely knew who you let ass frak you the night before? Over his bar, no less?

She guessed it would be best to just conduct herself professionally, business as usual. 

Except it had been so hot that she wished now that she'd invited him into her bed afterward, even if it was only to sleep beside him. The strength of her desire to have him around was surprising. There was something about this man beyond physical attraction, beyond their witty banter and their obvious sexual chemistry.

Or maybe it was just the quiet desperation she was feeling as each day at sea brought the reality of her retirement one day closer. Her therapist—frakker that he was—would have called her extreme risk-taking a way of sublimating her fear of retirement. 

"It is way too early for this shit," she whispered to herself, nursing her flask again. The rich and stinging taste of this liquor of choice reminded her of the only constant in her life, the one that had always been preferable to anything or anybody else.

Reminding herself that this was her last tour at sea, she decided to play it cool with Adama the best she could. If he wanted to frak, they'd frak, but that's all it would be. Five more nights of indulgence in his capable hands and she wouldn't have to think about him again. He'd be Bartender Bill, off sailing the seas, and she'd be Laura Roslin, retired former cruise director.

Setting that depressing thought aside, she decided to leave him an invitation, an offer she knew he wouldn't refuse. Five nights left and she wasn't going to waste a single one.

For now, it was up and at 'em for speed dating for dummies. Gods help them all.

*

In her busy day, Laura found a brief moment at her desk to pull out her special stationery that she rarely used. It was something her mother had given her many years ago, a delicate floral paper from a trip overseas, and there were less than a dozen sheets left of it.

She began writing Bill an invitation to join her that night. After writing his name, she hesitated. She wasn't sure whether to be flirty or play it cool. She could mention the hard ass frakking he'd given her—

"Hey, Laura," Tory said as she walked in and slammed a pile of programs down on Laura's desk.

"Oh Gods!" Laura shoved her arm across her nearly blank note and took a deep breath. "Oh, hi."

"Hello." Tory studied her, her head cocked. "You all right?"

"Totally. Yes."

Laura stared at Tory, who stared back at her. "Okay, Tory, what do you need?"

"Direction, maybe?"

Oh, sweet mothers of Kobol. "Go down to the pool and make sure Gaius isn't hitting on any women because he is not allowed to _do_ that on company time."

"And … I'm to stop him if he is?"

"Yes. Using any means necessary." Laura sharpened her stare into a glare. "Any. Means."

"All right." Tory shot her one last look of concern. Laura was convinced Tory was wondering if she was off her meds. Then Tory left, leaving her alone to her note writing.

"Okay, no ass frakking," she said under her breath, writing a hasty note and sealing it in an envelope before anybody else could interrupt. Then she sealed it with the ship's official wax seal and kissed it. She wasn't sure why she was going to such lengths for great presentation, but maybe Bill was the kind of man who appreciated that kind of thing.

She smiled as she strolled down to the elevator, taking it to his floor and slipping it into the mailbox on his door. She smiled the entire way back up. She wasn't used to smiling so frakking much.

It was a crazy thing.

*

The third night at the bar was particularly strenuous for Bill. He was exhausted from the previous evening—it felt like every joint he had was aching, his pain far surpassing the amusement of how he'd achieved it. His chest hurt to breathe, his limbs hurt to move.

No painkillers seemed to help, not even the strong ones. His head pounded and he felt more desperate for a drink than he had in a while, making him even crankier when he knew he couldn't have one. He had even gone back for a nap between shifts and found a note from Laura. It was the nicest looking note he had ever received, delicate paper and a wax seal on the envelope. It invited him to the pool that night after his shift, leaving everything else to his imagination.

Still didn't help. And that was a frakking shame.

The kids, as he'd started calling them, were in a rare mood tonight, sucking down liquor like it was their last night at sea. There was happy yelling, angry yelling, a few near fist fights over none other than Kara, who didn't seem to mind instigating a conflict and ate up the results. He admired her spunk, wishing it could rub off on him somehow. Somebody threw a chair across the room and it crashed against the wall. He didn't lift a finger, just turned his back and rubbed a fingerprint smudge off a highball glass.

Finally, they left.

His shift ended and left him feeling old. Terribly, terribly old.

He went back to his room.

*

Swimming at sea, under the stars, was something Laura never tired of in her years of cruising. They kept the pools warm and full of seawater and it was the perfect salve for sore muscles and frayed nerves after a long day of dealing with passengers. And thinking about Bill.

Rarely had she longed for her twenty-year-old body which she could slip into a bikini without worrying about potential stomach rollover. Those days were long gone but she assumed that Bill would appreciate her just as much in her black one-piece suit, sleek and tight all over, as he would in something skimpy enough to be shed in a quick second.

She smiled at the idea, occupying her mind with sweet thoughts of workarounds. Anticipation settled into concern that perhaps she'd overestimated the passion behind their affair so far.

It was almost eleven-thirty and he still hadn't shown. She knew his shift ended at eleven. She was about to leave when she heard the door to the pool deck slam shut. Squinting, she made out his form silhouetted against the interior hallway lights.

"Making a lady wait," she said. "Good thing you make a good first impression."

"Thanks for waiting," was his ineffectual response. She hoped the reason for his delay wasn't a bad one.

"I wasn't sure you were going to come tonight."

He pulled a lounge chair to the edge of the pool and sat on the side of it, elbows on his knees. "You don't know me very well."

She treaded water, moving closer to him. "No, I don't."

As she got closer she saw that he looked tired—more than tired. "Long day?"

"I'm sure you've had those before."

She folded her arms on the edge of the pool, looking up at him. "Bill, you look exhausted."

"I am. It's fine."

He obviously wasn't into conversation tonight. Instead they sat in front of each other speechless like awkward teenagers on a first date. She squeezed her upper arms together, hoping to inspire him to action with a bit more cleavage, but he seemed off in his own world, his face turned so she could only see his shadowed profile. She didn't feel uncomfortable with him like this—she instead felt like she needed some explanation for his behavior. It was only twenty-four hours ago that he'd had her over the bar, losing her mind.

Now she faltered at what to say. All day she'd rehearsed line after line of witty banter in her head, but he didn't even seem willing to get in the pool.

"What's wrong?" 

He chuckled and then sighed, turning to face her. "I'm not sure how to answer that."

Smiling, she reached over to tap on the top of his sandaled foot. "You could start by telling me the first thing that crossed your mind when I asked."

Bill shook his head and left a long silence in its wake. "Why did you invite me here tonight?"

"For company. Why did you come?"

"The same."

She stroked his ankle, then let her fingers drift up his calf. "So are you coming in?"

He moved his foot away and she frowned. "I'm not much of a good time tonight," he said.

"I don't mind. Just come in. It's warm. Might cure what ails you."

She saw his eyes narrow but he quickly corrected it. Standing up, he took off his shirt. She watched him, transfixed and wishing they were in full light. It was almost embarrassing that they'd frakked but she'd never seen him shirtless. She could barely see the outlined shadow of muscles. He looked thinner than she'd expected from the strength she'd experienced the night before.

Nudging off his sandals, he dipped a toe in the water a few feet down from where she hung onto the edge. Then he slipped into the water, silent and barely disturbing the still surface. She turned to him but he went under, under for a very long time. Then he surfaced with a gasp.

"Salt water," he grunted, rubbing his eyes.

"Oh dear," she said. "Is this your first cruise?"

He sniffled a bit and she moved closer to him, right next to him. "Yeah." His response was more of a grunt.

She hesitated, then pushed a few strands of hair back from his forehead, then let her fingers linger behind his ear. "I'm sorry."

"Just wasn't what I expected."

Something about his voice—maybe being in close proximity to him—was winding her up again, her breath caught in her throat. "Seems to be the theme of this voyage."

This caught his attention and he looked into her eyes; his expression wasn't the one she expected, not what she was used to. There was a haunted sadness there.

"Bill, I don't know what—"

He leaned in and kissed her, rocking her unsteady in the water. She gripped the side of the pool, her other hand splayed across the back of his head, pulling him closer. He moved in front of her, pressing her back into the wall, his kiss unrelenting.

It was what she'd been hoping for, but there was something wrong about it. Not that it was enough for her to stop—it was more of an unsettled feeling, churning deeply and mixing with arousal. A feeling that he needed this more than wanted it. 

He moved his mouth to her neck and tightened his body against hers. She expected to feel the hard outline of his cock against her stomach but didn't. Pulling him closer with a tug of her leg around his calf, she writhed her lower body against his, indulging in the thrill of his deep moan against her skin. 

Impatiently, he shoved his arm down between them, separating her body from his as he worked his hand between her legs. It was slow agony and, lacking a buzz, she felt herself straining to enjoy it as much as she normally did. 

There was a muted throb building where he was massaging her, his palm pressing and releasing the heat between her thighs. It was nothing like the night before, and apparently, he wasn't feeling it either. She whimpered, frustrated, and slid her hand down over his bare chest to squeeze the soft bulge in front of his shorts.

"What's going on, Bill?" she asked, hoping she didn't sound cross.

He looked up from kissing her chest. "Tired. Maybe this was a bad idea."

"No." She kissed his upper lip. "Not a bad idea. Just an idea not well executed."

He was quiet for a moment. "You don't taste like booze."

The statement shocked her even though, of course, it was true. "Does this surprise you?"

"No … I mean, yes. It's different. And I feel badly that you sobered up for this—"

"Sobered up?"

"And I couldn't deliver. I'm sorry. I'm saying all the wrong things." He moved away, landing with his back against the pool wall with what appeared to be resounding defeat. Laura took a deep breath, trying to contain her anger.

"Maybe it was a bad idea." She had to say it. She knew she shouldn't, but she couldn't stop herself from just one barb, even if it was a lie.

His heavy sigh broke whatever mood was left. "I was in a lot of pain today. I took some drugs to stop it, and it's obviously … stopped other things."

"Why were you in pain?"

It was way too quiet and she was tired of his silence. "I understand your need for privacy but shutting me down every time I ask a question—every time I'm concerned about you—that's not working for me."

"You don't need to be concerned about me." He leaned his head back, his arms spread across the edge of the pool. "That wasn't my intention."

"I know. It wasn't mine either." More anger and now she yearned for her flask which was safely and inconveniently stored back in her room—a very rare occurrence. "Trust me. I wasn't looking for this."

"You were just looking for sex."

"Well, weren't you?"

"Yeah, I was."

Laura turned around and pulled herself out of the pool. "I need to cool off and think about things. I need to think about what this all means." She walked over to her chair and grabbed her towel, wrapping it around her.

"It can't mean anything."

She looked back at him. The way the words caused a twist in her stomach was evidence that it already meant too much.

"For your first cruise, you sure have the whole 'no attachments' thing down."

"Wait." Like she wasn't already waiting, just to see if he would do the dramatic thing, have his turnaround, save the day, like in some frakked up romance novel. She stood, cold in the chill of the night air, as he made his way to the stairs at the shallow end of the pool and trudged up, using the bar for support. Then he walked over to his lounge chair and toweled off. How she was patient enough for him to perform these theatrics she didn't know.

"My mother always told me never to go to bed angry," he said.

He didn't approach her, though he was just a few feet away. He had to know how lame he sounded. It was not an apology or a concession. "Did your mother also tell you not to fight with girls?"

"Yeah. She did." He ran a hand through his hair as he slipped his feet into his sandals. "Laura, I don't have the energy for this. I don't know where we're going here, but we should sleep on it."

"I need time to think, too." There were a lot of other things she wouldn't say right now. He might not want to hear them—the good and the bad.

Bill walked over to her and kissed her forehead, then continued past her, disappearing through the same door he'd entered not even thirty minutes earlier.

DAY FOUR: Cabo San Awesome

Technically, Laura should have been back on board _Galactica_ coordinating the shore excursions, not wandering the streets of Cabo San Lucas. But what were they gonna do—fire her?

She laughed a little, the thought of screwing over corporate giving her a thrill. The dockyard was thronged with tourists browsing the tents and tables that sprang up on days when a ship was in port. Laura elbowed her way through the crowd, thankful for the anonymity that her sunglasses and wide-brimmed hat afforded her. 

Here she was just another American with a few hours to kill before setting sail again. 

She made her way to the pedicab stand, ignoring the protests of the drivers at the front of the queue when she approached a battered orange cab near the back of the line. 

"Cómo está, Miguel?"

"Ah, Doña Laura! I thought you say no more visits?"

Laura stepped into the cab as Miguel threw his leg over the bike seat. "Just one more. For old times' sake."

"Si, si. For old times."

Miguel pedaled hard, weaving through traffic around the port area, and Laura only relaxed when they emerged on the quieter village side streets. As they climbed the narrow switchbacked lanes, she watched the village recede below them. 

Soon they were up high enough to see _Galactica_ where she sat at anchor. There were a few people on deck—mostly crew, she suspected. After three days at sea, the passengers couldn't get off the boat fast enough. 

Laura didn't blame them. Being at sea did strange things to you. Like last night with Bill. Or more precisely every one of the last three nights with Bill. They'd gone from flirty to kinky to old married couple in record time. 

She was surprised how much his rejection bothered her. She tried telling herself he was just tired but maybe he was one of those men who needed things to be really kinky to get it up. 

If that was the case, it would be hard to top ass frakking a near stranger over the bar. She wasn't sure she wanted to try. Maybe it was best if they just let things be. She'd be back on shore—permanently—in a few days and Bill would be at sea, gone more than he was home. That was no way to start a relationship. 

The halting of the pedicab jolted Laura from her thoughts. She steeled herself before turning her eyes to the familiar spot by the side of the road. 

The three simple white crosses stood just as she remembered them. The one marked "Dad" in the middle, one with each of her sisters' names on either side. A few clumps of flowers bloomed half-heartedly in the shade of the roadside trees.

"I come up once a week," Miguel offered. "Make sure everything looks bueno."

"Thank you, Miguel."

He nodded and walked off across the road to smoke. He knew that she liked her privacy on these visits while she said a few words of prayer for her family. 

This would be her last visit for a long time. Perhaps ever. Her sisters and father were buried near her home. Miguel would tend the descanso, using the money Laura wired each month. He was a good man and their spirits would be well-tended, even in her absence.

In some ways, she was relieved that there would be no more days at anchor in Cabo San Lucas, that she would no longer feel the guilty pull of this place. 

Each time she stood here, she promised herself she wouldn't look, but each time she did. The trees below the road still bore deep scars from where the minivan had torn alongside their trunks. If she looked closely enough, she could make out bits of rusted wreckage farther down the cliff. 

Laura said her goodbyes and turned back to the pedicab and to Miguel, who was squatting in the shade. 

"Vamanos, Miguel." 

He stubbed out his cigarette and wiped the sweat from his face with a rag he carried in his pocket. The trip down the hill always went faster and they were both relieved to get started.

*

Bill had come up on deck looking for Laura. According to Tory, she was supposed to be at the excursions information desk, but all he found there was a couple of her minions conspiring over clipboards.

He'd really frakked things up the night before—he'd been moody with combined fatigue, pain, and stubbornness. He hadn't come on this joyride in order to fall in love; that hadn't been in his life plan. And he wasn't sure it was love, but it was feeling like a lot more than a fling. The easy thing to do would be to push Laura away. She was an incredible woman, but an incredible woman didn't need a man like him, in the state he was in.

He had no idea what Laura wanted. He'd thought from the way she came at him in the bar that she wanted to get laid, no strings attached. Because, seriously, who wants to tell their grandkids that kind of "how we met" story? 

But then last night, he'd felt blindsided by her concern and by how quickly she'd shut him down when he refused to share things that he had every right to keep private. When had hooking up with a woman gotten so hard? 

He was about to go down below to grab a nap when the roar of a boat engine drew him to the railing. Lee's boat was powering across the mouth of the bay, shooting a spray of water into the air hundreds of feet behind it. The winged horse airbrushed on the side of the boat looked like it was about to take flight each time Lee gunned the boat, pointing its nose up out of the surf. 

Bill watched as his son took the boat in tight circles, drawing screams of excitement from the passengers. 

"People eat that shit up."

Turning toward the voice, Bill found Kara standing beside him. She was in her dress whites, her cap perched on her head, looking every inch the professional. Seeing her made him stand up a little straighter. 

"He's good," Bill conceded. The kid knew how to handle a boat.

"You ever seen him race?"

"Not yet." 

It wasn't like Lee hadn't invited him. Bill just hadn't gotten around to going to a race. He'd barely gotten over Lee mustering out of the Coast Guard early. Bill had expected his son to make a career of it, rise through the ranks, retire with a nice pension. Maybe they'd even set up a charter business down in the Keys together.

Either way, that dream was frakked. It was stupid to place the blame on Lee now.

"The boats they race are—you gotta see it."

Bill glanced back at Kara. The way she felt about his son was written all over her face. "You go watch him often?"

She shrugged. "Once in a while. We should go together some time. Make a date of it."

Bill frowned. Before he could open his mouth to ask what she meant by that, she punched him in the shoulder.

"Psych. Had you going for a minute there didn't I, Old Man?"

Laughing, Bill shook his head. "You're a handful, Thrace."

She looked out over the bay, eyes tracking _Pegasus_. "That I am."

*

"Mas cerveza, señor?"

 _Galactica_ crewman Sam Anders, with wind-tousled hair and Oakley sunglasses, was enjoying the Cabo sun at a roadside bar that was little more than four barstools and a wooden counter. "Si, por favor," he said, finishing off the last bit in his current bottle. After cruising Mexico for almost a year, he'd developed the enlightened view that American beer was shit, so he got as much Mexican brew as he could before he headed back to the U.S.

Sam loved Cabo. He loved the weather, the food, the women. Every eight hours he had there, he decimated the place, like Hurricane Sam. And he enjoyed every last minute of it. He'd even thought of retiring in Cabo San Awesome once but decided that it would somehow take the shine off it.

This stop was different. There'd been a new woman in the crew—Laura Roslin's new assistant, who seemed to do nothing other than sit at a desk and play Space Angry Birds all day. Her name was Tory and she rocked out a bathing suit like Sam had never seen. He'd been courting her, but keeping it gentlemanly—unlike the women he usually entertained in port, Tory would sail away with him at the end of the day. That, and she seemed more conservative, which Sam respected in a lady.

When Tory asked him to take her out on Cabo, Sam had a crisis of faith.

When she told him she'd let him do body shots off her if he found a good bar, his crisis was wiped away.

So far, no body shots. Disappointing, but the day was still young. Tory sat next to him, nursing the last few sips of a margarita on the rocks and taking in the bustling tourist street activity around them.

"When do we, um, do the body shots?" Sam asked, aligning the bottle cap with the edge of the counter and cracking it off with one smack of his hand.

"When I'm drunk enough not to care." Tory adjusted her sunglasses, leaning back against the bar with both elbows. She swung one foot with prettily painted toes back and forth. "So is this what you do all day in port?"

Telling her he usually ate, drank, and engaged in group sex with college co-eds probably wasn't the right response. "Sometimes I look at the shops. You know, uh … for things." 

"Things." He watched her head move as she scanned the row of stores and independent vendors in tents hawking hundreds of Mexican tchotchkes.

Gods, he wanted to bang her.

"You know. Souvenirs." He chugged the rest of his beer, then tapped the counter so he could close his tab. "You want anything to send home to your family?"

"I'm not close to them." Tory drained her margarita. "So we're going to shop, then what?"

"Umm, we hit the beach, maybe?" High hopes for a bikini spotting there—either hers or others.

"Oh yeah. I brought something you might like."

"Score," he breathed. He probably should have contained himself, but she was already off the barstool while he busied himself paying for their drinks.

He caught up with her just as she was entering a very festive-looking tent. "You probably shouldn't walk away without me."

Tory took off her sunglasses in time for him to see her eye roll. "You gonna protect me?"

This woman was nearly too hot to handle.

Sam debated responding until he realized no response was necessary. Instead, he browsed the shelves of the store, filled with painted wood vases and carved rocks. He noticed there was one shelf that had a canvas curtain in front of it and, of course, it sparked his interest. He pulled back the curtain and saw a variety of small musical instruments.

He was particularly drawn to a small guitar. Reaching in, he hesitantly plucked the strings.

_Open your mind and hear what your heart wants to deny, end of line._

The voice in his head was deafening, the words garbled and nonsensical. He picked up the guitar and strummed a few chords, then a few more.

*

 _Galactica_ ship engineer Galen Tyrol, looking at postcards in a rack outside a very festive-looking tent, suddenly heard music. At first he thought it was inside his head, but he realized it was coming from inside the tent. He followed it and barely noticed the musician was one Sam Anders from his own ship. Instead he grabbed a tambourine and began to play rhythm with the sweet sound of the guitar, the tune filling the tent just as the woman next to Sam—Laura Roslin's assistant with the beautiful hair—began singing.

"Nibblin' on sponge cake … watchin' the sun bake, all of those tourists covered with oil …"

*

The uproarious sound of applause shocked Sam back into consciousness. He was holding a guitar, he was standing next to ship engineer Tyrol, and someone had handed Tory a bouquet of roses. And people were clapping. And throwing more roses.

"La flash mob! La canción es buena!" somebody cried.

"Let's get out of here," Sam said to Tory, grabbing her by the arm.

"Sam, wait," Tyrol said. Sam looked back and saw Galen was trying to make his way after them, but the crowd surrounded him, cheering and attempting to lift him off the ground.

Sam and Tory ran through the city streets until they ended up in a small patch of trees overlooking a white-sand beach. "What the frak was that?" Tory yelled, visibly shaken. "Do you even know how to play guitar? Do you know that song? Something happened back there, Sam. I don't even remember most of it. It was like something took me over."

Sam shook his head, unable to speak, unable to explain. Instead, he grabbed Tory and kissed her hard. She returned the kiss, grabbing his polo shirt and dragging him down in the sand with her. Tory lifted her shirt over her head, straddling his hips.

"Perfection," Sam said, cupping her bare breasts. 

He'd take an asscrack full of sand for this one.

*

Laura arrived back on _Galactica_ with the last of the passengers. She was exhausted from her shore excursion and in no mood for the Fun with Scrapbooking! class she was scheduled to lead in a mere fifteen minutes. Hopefully Gaius was already in the craft room setting up various papers, Martha Stewart decorative punchers, and border materials. 

She took a quick trip back to her room to freshen up, brushing her hair and washing her face of the bit of city dust that always seemed to stick. She'd left her flask on the counter—she learned once to never drink before or on shore excursions—and now it called her name. Just one hit before she faced a roomful of hell.

Bill's words at the pool echoed in her head again. _Sobered up._ She'd been stunned that he'd pinned her as an alcoholic so quickly. Was it that obvious to everyone? She knew she hadn't been exactly hiding it, but she was holding her job, doing it well, completely functional. Definitely not passing out in the hallways like the thousands of binge-drinking co-eds she encountered every year.

It never seemed like an addiction to her, but she'd never contemplated why she didn't feel inclined to go about her life without something alcoholic within arm's reach. She hated that she drank, because it was drinking that caused such destruction in her family. Yet it was drinking that led her through that labyrinth of depression and helped her emerge on the other side. It was a way to cope with it all, and it was a habit that had stuck since the accident. 

Bill knew nothing of this. He just saw her, tasted the liquor on her tongue, and that was normal to him. Her normal.

She glanced at her watch and ignored the urge to take a hit of her flask. This time.

With minutes to spare, she hoofed it up the stairs to the craft room. Out of breath, she was relieved to see Gaius handing out the booklets Tory had printed that described the basics of page layout and design. Walking into the room, she scanned the sparse crowd. Your typical scrapbookers—a couple moms in their thirties, a couple of grandmothers, and Bill Adama.

_Wait._

Laura did a double take as Gaius handed him a page layout book. Her mouth fell open and then Bill looked up, catching her eye and smiling. He flipped open the book and began to read, or pretended to read. She had no idea. Heartbeat racing, she realized everyone in the room was looking at her, expecting her to do something.

Anything.

"Welcome, welcome." Realizing her voice sounded faint, like her head felt, she cleared her throat and tried to blame it on the frog stuck there. "Welcome to Fun with Scrapbooking! I'm happy to see we've had a fine turnout today. How many of you have scrapbooked before?"

Everyone raised their hands but Bill.

"Oh, we have a new scrapper today! How are you today, Mister …"

"Adama. Bill Adama." He put the book down with a sigh. "I have to admit, I feel pretty scrapped."

The ladies in the room tittered with laughter. He was, indeed, a charmer.

"Well, then, Bill. I feel your fortune's about to change. Because scrapbooking is … fun!"

She wanted to kill herself for a brief moment. The women laughed again and he grinned at her, causing her to blush.

"All right, then, ladies and gentle _man_ ," Laura said, grabbing her book. "Why don't we move in an orderly fashion to the paper and decorative materials table, where Associate Cruise Director Gaius has, may I note, masterfully arranged what we'll be working with today."

"Thank you, Laura," Gaius said, beaming.

They all walked over to the table and Laura joined them, moving beside Bill. "Of all the hobbies I'd imagined you having, this wasn't one of them," she said in a low murmur.

"Maybe I'm not who you think I am," he replied, picking up several pieces of textured paper.

Laura handed him two lace doilies. "For your cover."

"These will be perfect." He took them and grabbed a red glitter pen. "Don't judge me for how this thing looks when I'm done."

She raised her eyebrows. "Sometimes the best things aren't pretty at all."

Leaving him to ponder that, she turned back to the room. "Please open your books to page one, and we'll start," she said as everyone settled in. "If anyone needs extra help at any time, just let me know and Gaius will assist you."

The look of disappointment on Bill's face was priceless.

"Don't worry," Laura said, settling into the empty chair next to him. "I always give the scrapbooking virgins a little extra help getting started."

He ducked his head and grinned at her suggestively. "You do, huh?" 

Flattered and surprised by his flirty tone, she couldn't help smiling back. Maybe last night really had been a fluke. He was anything but disinterested this afternoon. 

"You'll have to at least pretend you're here to scrapbook, Bill, or Mrs. Phillips over there will be broadcasting our impending marriage over the PA within the hour." 

Bill blew out a breath and studied the supplies scattered on the table. "So how does this work?"

"Most people start with a theme. Cruise memories is a popular one." 

Picking up the bright red glitter marker, Bill scrawled across the cover: _My First Cruise by William Adama_.

"That's … great."

"Hey, I'm just getting started." He reached for the doilies and a scissor, a look of intense concentration on his face as he folded the first doily in half and cut out a little paper man. Rotating the second doily under the quick snip-snip of the scissors, he produced a woman to match. "Glue?"

Laura squirted thin lines of glue on the back of the little paper couple and watched Bill glue them to the cover of his book so they were holding hands. Except that they didn't have hands. "Cute."

After admiring his work for a moment, he turned to the first page and wrote in big loopy script: _DAY 1_. "Pass me that dark blue tissue paper?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Seriously?" 

"I don't do things halfway, Laura. Once I'm in"—he held her eyes for a moment as he reached past her for the tissue paper brushing his arm against hers—"I'm all in."

Annoyed at the pointed tone of his words, she squirted a stream of glue on the page just a little too hard, making a gloppy mess of it. But she held her tongue. She wasn't going to let him get to her again. 

With the tissue paper stuck in place, Bill started punching out stars from a sheet of silver paper. "Something you want to ask me? Go ahead." His voice was eerily calm now. "Just know that you may not like the answer very much."

The stars fell across the dark blue of the page, and Laura was reminded of their meeting on deck that first night, the feel of his arm around her in the chilly night air. She opened a glue stick and silently began gluing the bits of silver to the page, dozens of them, as many as they'd seen in the sky and more. She was surprised to see Orion emerge on the page and then Scorpius. 

Beside her Bill studied the stars, lost in thought, and Laura studied him. She was surprised to find herself wondering what he looked like when he slept. If the sadness that seemed to be always just below the surface disappeared and left his face peaceful as he dreamed of better times. 

When he finally turned to her, she had to stifle the impulse to kiss him. Gods she wanted to kiss him right now. And he wanted to kiss her. She could tell by the way he was staring at her lips and edging closer. 

Mindful of cruise director protocol, she looked back down at their handiwork.

"Is this what you had in mind?" she asked, poking the last of the stars into place with the tip of her nail. 

"Yeah," he said, with a satisfied smile. "That's perfect." 

"I've always loved the stars," she said. "The jewels of the Gods." 

"I like that," he said, picking up a silver glitter pen to inscribe her words at the bottom of the page. "Sounds like something out of Greek mythology."

"Maybe," she said, certain it wasn't. She knew little about the ancient Greeks, certainly not enough to quote from. "It just … sprang to mind, I guess." 

After checking to be sure his writing had dried completely, he turned the page and inscribed _DAY 2_ at the top. 

Laura found herself holding her breath as she waited to see what he would choose to represent his second day at sea. Hopefully not a reproduction of her _Seaman's Choice_ stash. When he set about cutting something from a sheet of deep purple textured paper, she thanked the Gods that none of the other scrapbookers had chosen to sit at Bill's table. Because if he glued a paper bra and panty set into his book, she was going to die right there on the spot.

It soon became obvious that Bill was cutting out a huge purple "3." Laura felt a blush rise to her cheeks. She picked up the little bottle of glue but found it was empty. Leaning across the table to reach for a new bottle, she placed a hand on Bill's thigh for balance. 

And because she really really wanted to. 

"Careful," he whispered in her ear. "You wouldn't want Mrs. Phillips to stroke out on us."

Laura settled back in her seat but left her hand right where it was, inches from Bill's crotch. Thank the Gods for oversized tablecloths and strategic seating arrangements because what she was contemplating next really would cause the old lady to keel over. 

As she leaned in closer to spread some glue on the page, she let her hand slide higher, higher, until she found the object of her exploration. 

"Oh my," she said in a low voice. "I never realized scrapbooking could be so … stimulating."

Bill smoothed his number 3 on the page carefully, slowly, for far longer than was necessary, almost in time with the movement of her hand. "Maybe you weren't doing it right."

"And now?" She gave him a squeeze and was impressed with how his carefully composed expression didn't change, even as his erection twitched under her hand. She stroked the length of him through his pants and wondered just how far they could get away with taking this. "Am I doing it right?" 

Before Bill could answer, Gaius clapped his hands, signaling the end of the session. Curse him for learning that little trick so well. Laura jumped in her seat and snatched her hand back into her own lap as Gaius recited the instructions for clean-up.

"Thank you for coming," Gaius said to a group of departing ladies and Laura couldn't help notice the smirk on Bill's face. 

"You didn't," Laura hissed. 

Bill gave her an exaggerated frown. "You're not that good."

"I wasn't finished." She bent over the table, gathering up the supplies and giving him a view down her sleeveless blouse. "But if you'd like a more complete demonstration of my skills, that could be arranged."

Bill pushed his chair back and strategically crossed his legs. "I was thinking we could do something more traditional."

"Back to option two are we?"

"You could say that."

She frowned. They were back in that gray area that had gotten them into trouble last night. "Tonight isn't good. I've got cabaret night until ten and then we have the _Rocky Horror_ sing-a-long at eleven and a midnight dance-a-thon, which can go on for—"

"Hey, it's okay. Just give it some thought." The room was empty now and he took the opportunity to give her a quick kiss before departing, scrapbook in hand. 

*

With his arousal finally—though just barely—under control, Bill left the activities room, not sure what had just happened. He'd gone to the class hoping to make a good impression, maybe flirt a little, get back on Laura's good side. Somehow things had gone from flirty to awkward to serious then sexy and back to awkward again. He needed a frakkin' playbook to keep up with that woman. 

As he started down the stairs to the crew quarters, Bill spotted a familiar figure coming in the opposite direction. 

"Wuh-ho," Saul said. "I heard you and our lovely cruise director have been getting cozy."

Bill froze. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"A little bird at the poker game last night told me she saw the two of you making out in the pool."

Okay, that wasn't so bad. In fact, it felt pretty good. Bill puffed out his chest. "What if we were? A guy's got a right to get laid."

"Damn straight. No shame in that game." Saul glanced at the rolled up scrapbook in Bill's hand. "Whatcha got there?"

"Nothing." Bill put it behind his back and then felt foolish. "I went to one of Laura's classes. For moral support."

Saul laughed. "You ain't nothin' close to moral."

"Shut up."

"C'mere, lemme see that." Saul grabbed it from Bill's hand and unrolled it. "Scrapbookin', huh? Ellen does this shit sometimes. Says it helps her relax. I can think of better things …"

Bill felt a little less foolish. If Ellen did it …

"Good ol' Bill Adama, scrapbookin' for pussy. Never thought of trying that, but you might be onto something." Saul rapped Bill's arm with the rolled up pages before handing the book back to him. 

"Carry on, my friend." He clapped Bill on the back as he continued up the stairs. "Carry on."

Bill looked at the cover of the scrapbook with the childish figures on the cover. What the frak had gotten into him? He was all in, and then some. 

* DAY FIVE: En Route to Puerto Vallarta

Laura hadn't exactly signed on for option two but that didn't keep Bill from spending the rest of the day trying to come up with a way to ask her on a date. A real date, with food, drink, and a date activity. 

Not just _that_ activity.

While he was waiting for Laura to finish up on the phone, Bill happened to glance at the wrinkled, day-old schedule posted on her door.

Speed Dating for Dummies.

Maybe he should have signed himself up for that one instead of the scrapbooking. 

Because not only had he spent twenty-five minutes wandering the corridors looking for her office, he'd done it while carrying a single (now wilted) daisy that he'd swiped from a buffet arrangement like a complete frakking noob.

He was considering going back to his quarters to die a little when she finally hung up the phone.

"Bill! What a wonderful surprise. Come in."

Her office was pretty high end, probably because it was in an area that the general public might visit. He felt out of place amidst the bright colors, but she looked absolutely perfect sitting at her plush desk surrounded by photos of smiling passengers.

"I, uh—" _For godssakes Adama, man up._ "Nice office."

"Nice flower." Her smile took the sting out of it.

"It was when I picked it."

She took it from him and stood it in the half-empty water bottle on her desk. "Nothing a little water won't fix. What brings you here?"

Her confidence, the business-like way she was treating him, was messing with his game. He needed to change things up and quick.

"Option two." The heated look that passed across her face told him she was still thinking about option three. "You never gave me an answer about option two."

She leaned back in her chair, twirling a strand of hair between her fingers. "That's right, I didn't, did I? What did you have in mind? Besides the lovely flower, of course."

"A real date. Conversation. Dinner. Get to know each other a little."

"I'd say we already know each other better than most of the couples on this ship."

He blushed at the memory of their first bold encounter. Lowering his voice, he said, "I meant socially, not … carnally."

She put her hand to her lips, stifling a fit of giggles. 

"Fine," Bill said, rising to leave. "I get it. It was—"

"No, no, wait—" She struggled to compose herself and finally managed to settle down, blowing out a slow breath and fanning herself with her hand. "Sorry, nervous habit. I see your point. A date could be fun."

"Okay." He struggled to remember what he'd had planned. "Ten-thirty, okay?"

Glancing at the schedule on her monitor, she confirmed that it was. He'd stood to leave when she asked, "Bill, where exactly is this date going to take place?"

Shit. He hadn't thought that far. He'd half-expected her to turn him down. There weren't a lot of places the crew were allowed to socialize, let alone in private. His quarters were the size of a closet. The cafeteria was a zoo. The bar—no, not the bar.

"Don't worry," she said. "I have an idea. Meet me by the arboretum at seven."

*

Gaius was on the Baja Deck in a very secluded location enjoying an early evening frakking by his beautiful lady friend Caprica. She looked glorious in the ocean twilight, riding him while he sprawled out on his lounger, the plastic squeaking as their weight shifted.

"You are so lovely," he said, with all the sincerity he could muster.

She looked sad for a moment. "Gaius, do you believe in God?"

"Well I … He usually doesn't come up during times like this, or very rarely." Gaius pushed up into her, hoping to stave off what could become a very boring conversation. Caprica moaned and slammed her palm down on his chest. He cried out in pain. She squeezed her muscles around him and he grunted, feeling as if she could nearly snap his dick off if she kept up with this nonsense.

"Too … much … pressure," he gasped.

She stared down at him. "Gaius, the time has come for judgment and I want you to be spared."

Sometimes this woman went a little nuts. "My dear," he cooed, running his hands over her shapely ass and cupping each side. "All I need is you, my angel, to save me."

A dark shadow passed over their bodies. Gaius's head snapped to the side and he saw a huge black ship sailing way too close to _Galactica_. It flew a black flag with what appeared to be a shifting red LED light across it.

Gaius, startled, sat up and clutched Caprica. "What the everloving frak is that?"

Caprica kissed his temple, her arms slipping around his neck. She twirled the back of his hair through her fingers. "Perhaps judgment day's come early."

*

Captain Ellen Tigh stared out the bridge window at the large black ship that had come out of nowhere. One moment she was looking at a panorama of the open ocean, not a thing in sight, and the next moment there was a flash and there it was. Dangerously close and flying its telltale flag.

There was no way they were getting out of this.

"What the frak is that?" Lieutenant Felix Gaeta exclaimed, his eyes wide. "It … it just appeared on DRADIS, came out of nowhere."

Gaeta tended toward the dramatic, but this was an occasion in which his dramaticism was quite warranted. If only he knew how much.

"I've heard of ghost ships, but this is bullshit," Ellen said, trying to play cool. "Must be pirates."

"But it came out of _nowhere_."

Ellen knew exactly how it got there and exactly what it wanted. None of this made her feel good about the situation. "We must've missed it on the DRADIS."

"Sir … with all due respect, I miss nothing."

"You missed this!" She picked up her wireless handset and tried to find an outbound radio frequency to call for help, but every frequency was jammed.

Every frequency except one.

"Mayday, Mayday, Mayday, this is the M.S. _Galactica_ , our coordinates are—"

" _Galactica_ , it is so good to see you again. Am I speaking to the illustrious Captain Tigh?"

The voice coming over the radio sent a chill down her spine. "John."

"It's been far too long, Ellen."

"Not long enough." Ellen turned to Gaeta. "Gaeta, launch distress rockets. Since we can't emit emergency transmissions we're going to have to roll old school."

"Engaging distress rockets … are … jammed?" Gaeta said in astonishment.

"Shitfrak," Ellen growled.

"And don't think you're going anywhere—if you hadn't noticed, we've disabled your navigational systems and your outbound communication devices." John's voice over the radio was cool but it was tempered with a threatening tone Ellen knew all too well. "A baby could've done it. When was this ship built, anyway? 1985?"

"'89."

"You might as well invite me in."

"Do I have a choice?" Ellen set her jaw in anger.

"No," John said. "And I suppose there'll be no champagne cork popping as we board."

"If I knew you didn't already have weapons trained on my ship full of innocent civilians I'd pop something else _right into your ass_ ," Ellen replied. 

"Maybe later."

Ellen cringed at the thought. She needed her team—no, more than that, she needed Bill frakkin' Adama. Nobody else would do.

*

Bill was in the head, getting ready for his first real date with Laura when, unbeknownst to him, the pirates boarded the ship. His phone rang just as he was spritzing his favorite Giorgio Armani cologne on his neck.

"Adama," he growled, trying to make his voice sound sexy in case it was his date.

"Get up here now."

Ellen slammed down the phone.

_Well, shit._

He felt the ship slow. To anyone else, the minor change in velocity probably went unnoticed, but Bill had spent enough time in dangerous waters. His body was tuned to the ship, riding the water like he was seventeen again and barefoot on a board in the waves of the Gulf.

He dried his face on the towel slung around his neck. There could have been any number of good reasons for the unexpected change in speed. An unidentified object in the water. A frak-up in the engine room. Word from the next port that their arrival time had been pushed.

He cursed his lowly crew position and the inside cabin that came with it. He needed a window, some way to orient himself to the stars or the horizon.

Laura probably had a window. Maybe he'd get to see it tonight. He was thinking about how the window might fit into their plans—trying his best to ignore the captain's rude summons—when he heard the engines shudder, the ship slowing abruptly in the wake of the noise. Closing his eyes, he tried to sense movement but soon every nerve in his body was telling him they were dead in the water.

He grabbed his jeans from the hook behind the door and tugged them on, shoving his feet blindly into his boots as he buttoned up his pants.

There were few good reasons to come to a dead stop in open waters. And a lot of bad ones. He thumbed the combinations to both locks on his footlocker and triggered the false bottom. From the concealed compartment, he pulled a Glock in a shoulder holster and two spare magazines.

He dropped the footlocker lid shut with the heel of his boot as he pulled the holster on over his freshly pressed dress shirt. Grabbing his bulky fatigue jacket from the back of the narrow closet, he pulled it on, concealing the weapon under his arm.

The spare cartridges went in his right jacket pocket, same as always. When he brought his hand up to run it through his hair, he caught the smell of gun oil and metal and he was back in the jungle, strapping on his weapon for a confrontation with river pirates.

You're overreacting, he chided himself. You're on a frakkin' cruise ship off the coast of Mexico, not a junk on the Orinoco. Still, he wasn't taking any chances. He hit the corridor at a jog, heading for the bridge.

*

The rent-a-cops hired by the cruise line hadn't stood a chance against the well-armed pirates. By the time Bill arrived on the bridge, the intruders had subdued all but the last round of defenses. He pulled his sidearm just in time to join the standoff.

The two sides faced each other, menacing glares all around. Ellen, Bill, Kara and Anders brandished handguns on one side and the five pirates armed with semi-automatic weapons stood opposite them.

"Okay, you've made your point," Ellen said. "Now drop your weapons."

"You drop your weapons," replied one of the pirates. 

Bill did a double take. That frakker Doral. Bill hadn't recognized him at first. His usual teal jacket was gone, replaced by head-to-toe black combat gear. Frakking weasel, thinking he could pull an inside job right under the nose of Bill Adama.

Maybe this was his revenge for that bar clean-up Bill made him do a few days earlier.

"Look," Bill said, trying hard to keep the exasperation out of his voice, "just give your list of demands to the captain and we'll relay them to the owner of the cruise line."

The aggressive blonde—the one who seemed to be in charge—lowered her weapon and approached Bill, walking right up to the end of the Glock's barrel. "You sound like you have this all figured out."

Her smile sent a little shiver of fear down his spine, but Bill just shrugged. "I've dealt with your kind before." He nodded toward Ellen. "We both have, so let's keep things nice and civil. You can hand over your demands and then go back to your vessel to wait for a reply."

Beside him Ellen nudged his arm with her elbow.

"What?"

"The cruise line doesn't negotiate with terrorists."

Bill smiled half-heartedly at the blonde pirate. "Can you give us a minute?"

"Fine," she drawled, "but I don't have all day. Go on, have your little chat." She waved a hand in Ellen's direction and walked back to her side of the standoff.

Lowering his voice, Bill said, "What do you mean they don't negotiate? _No one_ negotiates with pirates. You pay the asking prices and they go away."

"Ransom isn't exactly a line item in the corporate budget, Bill. We're ferrying tourists to the Mexican Riviera, not running tanks out of Pyongyang."

Bill glanced over at the pirates and their five guns, all trained on him and Ellen now. Turning back to Ellen, he said, "Then it looks like you're frakked."

"What do you mean _I'm_ frakked?"

"I'm just the bartender. When they go looking for fingers to cut off and mail to the corporate headquarters, I'm gonna be so far down that list I'll be dead of natural causes before they get to me."

"Frak you, Adama."

"Okay, enough with the chit chat." Bill's head instinctively snapped around in search of the new voice and he found himself eye to eye with the dark-haired pirate, who he swore he'd seen serving up sushi in the buffet line just yesterday. She looked bored with the whole process. "You have something that belongs to us and we're not leaving until you hand it over."

"And what would that something be?" Ellen asked slowly, like she was talking to a five-year-old.

The dark-haired woman fixed her with a hard stare. "Don't play dumb with me. You know exactly what I'm talking about and you have twenty-four hours to deliver."

"Oh my Gods," Kara said with a laugh. "This is like the worst pirate movie ever. How are we supposed to give you something when we don't even know what it is?"

"Shut up," all five pirates snapped.

Bill prayed that Kara wouldn't say the first thing that popped into her head, which was probably _no, you shut up_.

Fortunately, Ellen intervened. "Enough. You said twenty-four hours. I heard you. Now get off my ship."

The leader of the pirate gang nodded and on her signal the five of them began backing off the bridge. Bill wondered if they would back themselves all the way off the ship. 

But he had more important things to be curious about. He turned to Ellen. "You have a lot of explaining to do."

*

The crisis team assembled around the table included the captain, the bridge crew, the senior staff and their aides plus the bartender.

Laura couldn't help but notice the strange looks that Bill was getting from the other senior staff. The last time they'd included a bartender at an emergency crew meeting, half the passengers had fallen ill with listeria, thanks to some tainted ice.

But from the look on the captain's face, the crisis they were facing right now made fifteen hundred people with diarrhea look like a day at the beach. She grimaced and dismissed that disturbing analogy from her mind. Lords she needed a drink. She'd told herself she would show up for her date with Bill stone-cold sober and now she was paying for that quaint notion with a bad case of the jitters.

She stilled her foot where it was bouncing a dangling pump under the table and smoothed her skirt. The captain called the meeting to order with a tap of her gavel on the table.

Laura had never seen a captain use a gavel before, but then again, there were a lot of things about Ellen Tigh that were unique.

"As I'm sure you're all aware," Ellen began, "we have an emergency situation on board." She briefly outlined the incident—boarded by pirates, twenty-four hours to meet their demands, negotiating with terrorists is against company policy.

Laura raised her pen. "Have you spoken with headquarters? Given the potential PR nightmare we're facing, I think they might reconsider their … policy."

Felix spoke up before the captain could answer. "They've jammed all outgoing communications. Cells, shortwave, ship-to-shore, satellite phones. Even our nav systems are completely frakked. All we've got left is the onboard phone system—"

"Thank you, Mr. Gaeta," Ellen said.

"So you're telling us," Laura said, directing her words to the captain, "that we're adrift in international waters with no navigation and no communications and no way to get rid of a bunch of frakking pirates who want to … what?"

"The Asian one said something about total annihilation of the human race, I think," Kara said.

"The pirates," Ellen began, her eyes locked with Laura's, "have made certain demands that we're unable to meet. To do so would endanger—"

"The human race?" Kara seemed to think this was a joke. Even Laura was starting to get pissed off with her childish comments.

"—many, many people," Ellen finished.

"So what are you saying, exactly?" Gaius blurted out from his position at Laura's elbow. "Are you saying that we're carrying something dangerous on this ship? Because I'm certain that's a violation of international law. Or at the very least, dangerous and not at all what I signed up for."

"Gaius," Laura hissed.

"But Laura darling—"

"Not. Now."

Gaius huffed out a sigh and sank back into his chair. Laura reminded herself to bring Tory to these events from now on. The further away Gaius got from the activities room, the less fun he became.

The captain spoke up over the din that erupted around the table. "The demands of the pirates are the problem of the bridge officers. This meeting is to discuss how well provisioned we are for withstanding a prolonged standoff."

Laura didn't miss the look Bill shot the captain as she delivered this news. She tried to catch his eye, but he dropped his gaze back down to the pad he'd been scratching notes on since she arrived.

"Chief, what's our fuel status?"

"Still three quarters full plus the reserve tank," Tyrol replied confidently.

"Good. Mr. Gaeta, you've already informed us of our communications and navigation status. Saul, how's the water situation?"

The head of the maintenance crew squinted at his wife with his one good eye. "Same as it always is. We can desalinate more than we'll need as long as we have power. I'll switch over the showers, toilets and slop sinks to seawater and start banking fresh water for when the fuel goes dry."

A few people around the table gasped at that last suggestion but Ellen quickly quashed her husband's moment in the spotlight.

"I don't think that will be necessary, but thank you for being prepared for the worst." She looked around the table. "You'd all benefit from more of that kind of thinking. Chef Romo?"

"Well, ma'am, if we're thinking worst case scenario, we have about five days of food on ration quantities and then we'd have to start fishing, I guess."

"There's always the cat," Bill muttered.

"Baaah. That cat'll feed but two people max, and he's a shitty mouser," Saul said.

"Objection!" Romo said, jumping up out of his seat. "What's he doing here anyhow? Last time I checked _bartender_ wasn't exactly an executive position."

“Oh, and Chef is,” Bill shot back.

"Thank you, Mr. Romo," Ellen said, ignoring the outburst and all that it implied.

 _Damn, she's good_ , Laura thought. Bill was side-eyeing Chef Romo where he sat two chairs to Bill's left.

Laura cleared her throat, drawing everyone's attention away from the two men. "We'll prepare to reposition our staff for crisis management and mental health and welfare support on your orders, Captain." Which meant they'd sit around the office, bitching about how whiny the passengers were while handing out "Stress and You" booklets to anyone who wandered into the activities center looking to distract themselves from the crisis.

"Thank you, I think that wraps things up here." Ellen stood, effectively dismissing them. "Nonessential personnel are dismissed."

Everyone stood to leave except Thrace, Anders, Gaeta, Agathon, the Tighs, Tyrol and … Bill. Again Laura tried to catch his eye on her way out, but he refused to look at her. Something wasn't right here. More secrecy, more evasion. It was getting old.

She turned to Gaius as they exited the ward room. "Are you as curious about what's really going on as I am?"

"It's really none of our business."

Dropping her voice so the other staff members in the corridor wouldn't hear her, she replied, "Which is exactly why I'm dying to know what's being said in that meeting."

Gaius shot a glance over his shoulder as the door to the ward room thudded closed. Laura watched his eyes narrow. Gaius hated being left out of the loop.

*

"There's something I haven't been completely honest with you about," Ellen began.

Bill had heard this before from Ellen, but he was pretty sure she wasn't talking about the herp this time. "Is it related to why there's an entire boatload of pirates off the starboard bow demanding something that nobody else besides you knows exists on this ship?"

"It's entirely related to that."

Anders let out a sigh, sprawling out in his chair and rolling his eyes. "You know, when I signed up for this gig, there was a lot of talk about chicks in bikinis and no talk about pirates. None. Everybody knows there's no pirates within, what, at least three hundred miles of Mexico."

"Well, Samuel, we're three hundred one miles away. And there is something you need to know. Something … you all need to know. It's a secret about me and it's a secret about a few of you."

Suddenly Saul jumped up on his chair. “Do ya hear that?”

“The incessant bitching? Yes, yes I do,” Ellen said.

“No. More than that.” Saul strode to the wall, pounding on it with his fist and yelling. "Will ya _please_ stop playin' Jimmy Buffett in there? We're tryin' to conduct a meeting!"

"I don't hear any Jimmy Buffett," Gaeta whispered to Agathon.

"Which song?" Agathon asked Saul.

"'Margaritaville,'" Anders said. "Don't you know shit? Everybody knows that song."

Tyrol looked around nervously. "Yeah, who doesn't know that song …"

"No, Sam, I don't hear anything," Gaeta said. "Nothing except you being an—"

"STOP THE FRAKKIN' MUSIC," Saul hollered into the wall.

*

"Where is that coming from, for the sake of the Gods?" Gaius whispered frantically. He and Laura were cramped into a small bathroom, pressed up against its adjoining wall with the meeting room. The mesh between the slats of the wall allowed for a somewhat obstructed view and Laura hoped to hell Saul couldn't see them like they could see him. Luckily, he was busily pounding at the wall about five feet away from them.

"My frakkin' cell phone alarm, sorry." Laura scrambled for her phone. She managed to turn it up—damn jittery hands—and three more thumps against the other side of the wall rattled the both of them.

"What's the alarm for?" Gaius asked.

"Happy hour."

Laura was not very happy.

*

"It stopped," Saul said.

"Can we continue?" Ellen motioned to the table. "Sit down, honey."

It had shaken Ellen when the song began to play and even more so that everybody heard it. It had been a long time since she'd heard "Margaritaville" and every time she did, trouble followed.

Saul walked back to the table and sat, eyeballing Gaeta. "Somebody needs to get his hearing checked. I'm no fool."

"It's not a something that the pirates are demanding," Ellen explained, faltering for words. "It's someone. Some … ones."

"Like a kidnapping?" Gaeta said.

"Yes, Mr. Gaeta, very observant."

Saul rolled his eyes and mimicked Gaeta's words behind his head. Ellen made a note to talk with Bill about keeping Saul out of the private stash. If there would even be a private stash left after this little debacle was over.

"So who do they want?" Anders asked.

"That's not important. What you need to know right now is that there are five people on this ship who are very, very valuable. And no matter what happens, we can't let them fall into the hands of the pirates."

"But you're not going to tell us who they are …" Kara said.

"That's right. It's safer for all of us that way." Ellen wished she had a drink. "Especially them."

Gaeta leaned forward, folding his hands on the table. "But they know who they are, right?"

"Only one of them does."

"So it could be any of us then?" Anders pointed to Saul. "It could be him."

"Hey, who are you pointin' at? It could be you, ya arrogant sack o' crap."

Ellen banged her gavel on the heavy wooden table. "Enough, gentlemen. And I use the term loosely."

*

On the other side of the wall, Gaius had gone wide-eyed. "It—it could be me! I could be in danger!"

"Shhh, I'm sure it's not you." Laura pressed her ear to the wall but all she heard was the scraping of chairs as the bridge crew filed out of the ward room.

"But why not? Why wouldn't it be me?"

"Because you're too important."

"So …" Gaius looked confused. "The pirates want … the least important people?"

Laura's fingers twitched for the flask that was no longer at her hip. "I mean … Gaius, I need you to do something for me that nobody else can do."

She hoped that her frustration didn't show. The longer she spent without a drink, the harder it was getting to communicate effectively. 

"Oh," he said, smoothing down the front of his shirt. "Of course. Yes. Just say the word—"

"Gaius! Focus. Right now what I need you to do is go back to the office and start preparing the 'Stress and You' handouts. Hopefully the printer cartridges are full. Gods help us all if they aren't. I think we're going to need a lot of them."

"A lot?" His voice went up a whole octave—never a good sign—but Laura didn't notice.

As they sneaked back out into the corridor, she was contemplating why Bill was at the meeting. And why he wasn't exiting the ward room with the rest of the crew members. Obviously there was more to her new lover than met the eye.

*

Bill was out of his chair before the door to the ward room closed behind the last of the bridge crew. "You knew this was coming, didn't you?"

Ellen laid her palm on his chest, fingering the edge of his open dress shirt. "I might have had a suspicion."

Wrapping his hand around her wrist, he pulled her closer. "Don't frak with me. I'm not one of your wet-behind-the-ears crewmen."

"Get your frakkin' hand off me or this will turn into a replay of the night we met."

Bill let her go. A knee to the nuts was the last thing he needed now that he was finally getting laid again. He glanced at his watch, wondering if his date with Laura was still on. If those frakking pirates cockblocked him …

"Give me the short version," he said, all business now.

"I'll take this whole ship down with me if I have to."

Bill knew the protocol. You didn't turn over a high-value target to the enemy. Better to destroy an asset than lose it. "So we need to take out the pirates—or whatever the hell they are—before the deadline?"

Ellen nodded. "And we need to do it quietly. I was thinking you could attach a bomb to their hull."

"A quiet bomb?"

She rolled her eyes. "We'd be long gone by the time it detonated."

"And you just happen to have a remote-detonating bomb big enough to blow up this boat?"

"I might."

Bill sighed. It was worse than he'd anticipated. He popped the lid off the pill bottle in his pants pocket and shook one white capsule out. When had he learned to do that one-handed?

"What do you need from me?" He turned the pill over in his fingers, still concealed in his pocket.

"Your tactical knowledge."

"Bullshit. You could out-strategize me any day."

She frowned. "How are you feeling?"

"That's irrelevant. Tell me what you need. I have plans for tonight that are far more interesting than standing here arguing with you."

"No need to get bitchy about it." 

She outlined her plan and Bill agreed it might work, if she could fill in some of the holes in the next few hours. He made some more notes on the pad and then thought for a moment, finally giving in to his need for the painkiller in his pocket.

Arms folded, tapping her foot impatiently, Ellen watched him toss back the pill. "That's not going to affect your performance is it?"

"Let me worry about my _performance_." He tore the top page off his notepad. "This is what I'll need. Substitute for anything you don't have on hand. I'll be back at oh-two-hundred to get started."

He looked at his watch. That gave him four hours to spend with Laura. He was gonna make the most of them.

*

Laura was surprised they were still going through with this date idea.

After the frakkin' pirates left the ship and all the meetings had finished, she'd spied Bill and Captain Tigh exiting the ward room together. Just the two of them.

She hadn't been able to hear what they were saying, but she had no trouble reading their body language, especially Ellen's. The familiarity between them had been glaring. Thinking of it now made her stomach twist—far worse than the constant churning of alcohol withdrawal, and that was saying a lot.

It was obvious they were frakking.

But she wouldn't think about that just now. It had been a long time since a man had wanted to romance her. That kind of connection wasn't something she was going to throw away just because she might have a little competition for his attention. Especially not when she was the one about to have a few glorious hours alone in the dark with Bill while Captain Tigh did whatever it was that captains do. 

Taking his hand in hers, Laura guided Bill up the dark narrow stairs that led to the projection booth.

"Interesting place for a date," he said as she closed the door behind them.

She looked around the small, shabby room. It was little more than a cheap velvet loveseat and an outdated sound console. The film projector had been sold on eBay years ago, replaced by a digital model housed in the wall above them.

"It's one of the few places we can be sure of being alone."

They could have just gone to her suite but Bill had insisted on a proper date, so here they were.

"I brought us drinks," she said, pulling a bottle of chardonnay along with two plastic cups from her oversized bag.

Bill set down the nachos, popcorn and hot dogs he'd picked up at the concession stand.

Looking over their dinner spread, they both said, "Is that it?"

"You don't drink _wine_?"

"You don't like _nachos_?"

Bill frowned. "I'll just go grab a soda downstairs. Do you want anything else?"

Laura spied a box of Milk Duds in his pocket. She grabbed him by the shirt front and pulled him close, kissing him long and slow as she slipped her hand in his pocket. "Don't be long," she whispered.

"Don't eat all my Duds."

Not the most romantic thing a man had ever said to her.

As Laura filled her red Solo cup with chardonnay, the theater darkened and the opening frames of the movie filled the theater. _Titanic_.

Tory was really losing it. First washing Laura's white panties with the strange red dress she'd found on Gaius's floor and now this.

And Laura couldn't even call her up to chew her out because the frakking pirates had jammed their cellphones. She was contemplating chugging her chardonnay to console herself when Bill returned.

" _Titanic_ , huh?"

"Remind me to fire Tory."

Bill dropped into the loveseat beside her, jostling the both of them with a squeak of the worn springs. He nestled the bucket of popcorn in his lap and draped one arm across the back of the loveseat. Laura sipped at her wine and contemplated what she'd heard—or more precisely hadn't heard—earlier. She wasn't really the type to sit and stew over things and so far she'd had no luck beating around the bush with him when it came to relationship talk … 

"Are you frakking the captain?"

Bill froze, a handful of popcorn suspended halfway between the bucket and his mouth. "What?"

"I just—I know we aren't exactly dating, I mean not exclusively, but"—she took a long sip of wine, swallowed, and composed her next words carefully—"if you're hitting that then I'm gonna need you to wear a condom next time, if there is a next time—"

"Hey, hey, slow down." He dumped the handful of popcorn back in the bucket. "What makes you think me and Ellen are … you know."

"You're not a very good bartender, for one, and then after the frakking pirates left—you were the only one who got a private _briefing_."

Bill's eyes narrowed. "Were you spying on me?"

"No. Yes. A little." She brought her cup to her lips and was disappointed to find it empty already. When she reached for the wine bottle, Bill stopped her.

"You haven't asked me why I'm on this ship. Now you're assuming I'm here as some kind of plaything for a happily married woman."

"I didn't. Not until I saw the two of you walk out of that room together, looking a little too … cozy."

Bill settled back into his seat. "Huh."

"Face it, Bill. We don't know much of anything about each other." She pushed past him for the wine bottle again, filling her cup. "And you know … usually that's not a problem for me. I've had my share of at-sea flings, and I couldn't care less where those people are at now. And I didn't care where they came from. They were fun, and … I can't believe I'm telling you all this but I'm going to roll with it, okay?"

He was looking at her, examining her like she was some kind of exotic animal. Laura pounded her wine. No need to be classy anymore; she'd just professed to being some kind of on-board whore.

"I'm curious, that's all. This whole night is supposed to be about getting to know each other and I don't really care what your favorite color is or how you like your steak cooked. And I'm a little jealous, if you want to know the truth. You and the captain have a history and I don't like Ellen Tigh getting the drop on me when it comes to the sexiest man on this ship." She turned toward him, crossing her legs and resting her hand lightly on his knee. "It's obvious that there's more to you than meets the eye."

She waited for his response and watched him put the bowl of popcorn down on the floor in front of them. Upon sitting up, he reached over and ran his fingers down her cheek.

"There's more about me than I have time to tell you right now." Eyes averted, he traced the neckline of her shirt. The rapid infusion of wine was starting to make its presence known in her system, but the dull throbbing she felt low in her belly had nothing to do with the chardonnay.

"Well, I've got all night." Laura slid her palm closer to his inner thigh. That got his attention, but when he looked into her eyes she saw more concern than lust.

"I don't," he said. "In a couple of hours I've got something very important to do."

She bit her lip, trying to read him. "Am I allowed to know?"

"It's better if you don't," he said. "At least for now."

He silenced any objection she might have raised with a kiss. So much for the getting-to-know-you portion of the date, Laura thought, as she felt his fingers slipping the buttons of her blouse free.

*

Bill knew he was still a man when, a couple of hours before undertaking a complicated military maneuver, all he could think about was how best to have sex on a velvet loveseat that could give way any minute.

There was so much he could say; he could write volumes of it down. It's why he didn't know where to begin when Laura began asking questions about who he was. Couldn't he just be Bill the bartender who was up for a good frak?

He knew he wanted to be more than that to her but, as had become obvious over the last few months of his life, making long-term connections didn't seem all that worth it anymore. Hell, he hadn't even held out much hope of getting laid again.

Laura's hand moving higher on his lap helped him refocus. Realizing it could be the last time he touched a woman—though every time he touched a woman nowadays he realized that—he was ready to take it slowly. Slowly, on a deadline.

Her mouth moved to his neck, feather-light touches that made his hair stand on end. "What are you thinking?"

"Nothing." Her blouse open, he ran his fingers across her bare skin and over the swell of her breast.

"You always lie to the women you sleep with?"

"Yeah." He put a hand on her ass, pulling her closer. "Get over here."

She raised her eyebrows, then stood up and shed her blouse. Watching her climb into his lap was all his little sailor needed to get fully into the game. She held his cheeks and kissed him hard, wine strong on her breath. His hands worked of their own accord, sliding over her pants, her back, fingers tangling in her hair to draw her more deeply into his kiss.

She lowered her body onto him, rubbing herself against his pants with a few lazy rolls of her hips.

"Am I lying now?" he said against her cheek.

"If you are, you're incredibly good at it."

She had an answer for everything. He pulled one of the cups of her bra down, exposing her breast to his waiting lips. When he flicked his tongue across her nipple, she gasped and tightened her grip around the back of his neck.

An answer for everything except this, he thought, pulling out every trick he knew. How had he missed out on this until now? Her breasts were exquisite. He would have been content to spend all night exploring them, but she gave him only a few minutes of playtime before sliding down off his lap.

"I think I owe you." She smiled up at him as she pulled his belt free.

"You don't owe me." His breath hitched as she freed him from his pants and boxers and wrapped warm fingers around him. He helped her out, shoving his pants down his thighs to give her better access. "But I'm not gonna say no."

Settling down into the loveseat, he rested his head against the back and let his thighs fall open lazily. He felt completely at ease with her. And she was good, amazingly, incredibly good. She wrapped her hand around his shaft with just the right amount of pressure while she swirled her tongue over the head, down the underside and back again in a maddening rhythm.

The movie flickered away in the theater, throwing just enough light in the booth to let him watch her as he took him fully into her mouth, soft yet demanding. Her free hand found his balls and he nearly leaped off the couch when she wrapped a hand around the top of his scrotum and squeezed.

"Laura—"

She stopped and frowned. "Not good? I heard it helps men of a certain age stay hard longer."

He gently pried her hand off his balls and rested it on his thigh. "I've got that part under control. Don't worry."

When she lowered her head to begin again, he was suddenly self-conscious. Did she think he wasn't hard enough? He'd nearly lost his erection the other night midway through—and then that poor showing in the pool—but that had nothing to do with her or his age.

Wrapping a hand around her upper arm, he tugged gently. "Come back up here. I want to kiss you."

The mood had faltered and she looked a little uncertain.

"And take off your pants," he added, unbuttoning his shirt. "None of this half-dressed crap tonight."

She stood in front of him, smiling again, back in her element like she'd been in front of that crowd on the Sunburst Deck. He appreciated a woman who liked to be on display. Slowly, she released the button on her pants, then drew the zipper down. She shimmied out of the snug-fitting garment and stood before him in a barely there scrap of lace.

Sliding forward on the couch, he drew her to him, pressing his lips to her bare stomach as he slid her panties down her hips. The smell of her was intoxicating in the small room. He wanted to do everything at once. Make love to her. Frak her senseless. Hold her all night, skin to skin, while they talked about everything and nothing.

Frak, he was getting sentimental.

Determined to work with what he had available, he sat back on the couch and pulled her onto his lap. She settled easily on him, not yet taking him inside her. Kissing him slowly, teasing him with her body as she pressed her breasts against his bare chest, she seemed like a whole different person from the desperate, wanton woman he'd frakked over a bar just a couple of nights ago.

The feel of her sliding warm and wet over his cock was heaven but he wanted more.

"Laura, please—"

She hummed her agreement and with a shift of her hips, he was in. For a moment he held her like that, resting against his chest, feeling her breathing rise and fall with his while he pulsed inside her.

When she finally began moving, it was with a slow deliberate rhythm that reminded him of the ocean. He let her set the pace, focusing on kissing her lips, neck, shoulders, breasts, enjoying the little sounds she made as she rubbed her clit against his body this way and that. She tilted her head back, hair cascading over her bare shoulders. 

They climbed together, slowly, until her breathing grew heavy and she shifted on his lap, leaning in to kiss him with enough force to press him back into his seat.

He broke their kiss. "I want to make you come. What do you need?"

She placed his hand between her legs and showed him how she liked to be touched, her fingers guiding his until he got it right. It wasn't his usual approach, but they didn't have a lot of time for trial and error and he wanted to make it good for her.

"Like that," she whispered, riding his hand and his cock together now. "Just—don't stop."

He couldn't decide where to look, first captivated by the sight of where they were joined and then drawn to the look of complete abandon on her face as her orgasm built.

She was watching his hand, biting her lip, so focused on coming that Bill was afraid she wouldn't get there. He didn't want a repeat of last night.

"Laura," he said. Her eyes flicked up to his and he held her gaze. She was panting hard, a sheen of sweat breaking across her forehead. He thrust up into her, throwing off the carefully controlled movement of her hips but not missing a beat with his hand. Thrusting again, deep and hard, he held her gaze and said, "Now."

A look of surprise crossed her face and then relief as her orgasm hit hard. Bill let go then too, thrusting with abandon as she cried out and locked her knees against his hips.

They stayed that way a moment before Laura sighed and relaxed against him, dropping her head to his shoulder.

"That was …"

"Yeah." He shifted around on the small couch, amazed it had held up under their onslaught. Somehow he managed to find a comfortable position for them—him on his back, one foot on the floor for balance, and Laura draped over and around him.

"We could go somewhere more comfortable," she said. "My quarters, maybe?"

He had just under an hour at best and he was in no hurry to get up and dress. "Let's just enjoy this."

Pressing a kiss to his chest, she murmured her agreement.

Bill was surprised to find he was dozing off when Laura's voice brought him back to reality.

"Are we ever going to get to option two?"

Bill glanced around them, at the empty wine bottle and uneaten hotdogs, their clothes discarded on the floor. He traced a finger down her bare spine, memorizing the dip of each small bone. "Maybe we aren't cut out for option two."

Squeezing him tightly, she sighed. "Maybe not."

*

Bill hurried through the door of the captain's quarters, running a hand through his hair. Ellen was sitting at her desk and took a glance at her watch.

"Nice to see you, Bill. And your undone belt."

He grabbed his belt buckle and kept eye contact with her, smirking a bit as he fastened it.

"I'm guessing that wasn't from a quick stop in the loo on the way up."

"Not quite." He walked over and took the chair in front of her, his thighs aching.

"You're six minutes late."

He grabbed a breath mint from the bowl to her left. "I never come early." He unwrapped the candy and popped it in his mouth. "Except that one time."

They burst into laughter.

"It's like we're not even under siege, here," Ellen said, wiping a tear from her eye. "Frakkin' asshole."

Bill nodded, then took a deep breath to settle himself. He was flying high—the post-orgasmic adrenaline rush from Laura, the equivalently exciting prospect of a new life-threatening mission. It was as if his life suddenly had purpose. The significance of that wasn't lost on him, but he reserved further thought on it for later.

"We're sending over a crate of rations that the frakkin' pirates requested. The story is that it's taken Chef Romo several hours to compile everything they wanted."

"They wanted our food?"

"Food and hygiene items. In particular, they requested Kraft Macaroni & Cheese and all the soap we had."

"I don't even want to know. So … I'm hiding in the box?"

Ellen laughed. "You've gone amateur, Bill. I know it's been years, but …" She flipped open the crate. It was filled to the brim with Kraft boxes, Ramen noodle cups, and many kinds of shower gels and soaps. "As soon as the rations are seated deep within the hull of the pirates' ship, I'll detonate the remote weapon. It's a small bomb that will cause minimal damage yet leak a noxious gas that Chef Romo has gathered from the exhaust of the crewmen's lavatory."

"Jesus, poor Romo," Bill said.

Ellen shrugged. "Okay, actually, it's just pepper spray."

"Right." Bill picked up a box of Kraft and shook it; he always liked the sound. "But that's just the theatrics to distract from my mission."

Ellen walked over to a large duffel bag and unzipped it. She reached in and hefted out a bulky, black wetsuit.

"You up for a late night swim, Adama?"

*

Laura had left Gaius in charge of the next afternoon's activities—a prime and coveted spot in the world of activities directors. Gaius was taking pride in his newfound responsibilities—it was obvious to him that Laura finally trusted him as her willing protégé. Perhaps she was even prepping him to take over for her when she retired. There were rumors that they were bringing in Mindy Starr from _Cloud9_ but Gaius doubted Laura would allow that. Not after the incident with the mechanical bull at last year's company picnic. 

No matter. He wouldn't think about that right now. He needed to focus on making sure everything was in place for his moment in the sun. Gaius had worked long and hard to build Laura's trust and there was no way he was going to frak it up now.

"Where are we going?" Caprica asked him as he led her through the ship's main dining room. The tables had been cleared and prepped for the midnight buffet, which Gaius had learned from the daily activities journal was a Mardi Gras theme, complete with bead throwing, jambalaya, and alcoholic slushies.

"I need to get a few things for tomorrow, my sweet," he said. He opened the swinging door to the galley and let her go first, as gentlemen do. She looked around wordlessly and he worried that he might be boring her. It was no matter. This would take but fifteen minutes and then they'd have the rest of the evening to themselves. Preferably in the ship's rear-deck hot tub. With the Mardi Gras buffet in full swing there was no chance anyone would come upon them.

"Romo?" Gaius called. The kitchen was eerily quiet and that dastardly cat Lance was sleeping sprawled out upon a stainless steel countertop. "Chef Romo, are you here?"

"My vessel is here," Gaius heard from a storage closet, "but my spirit is gone."

Gaius walked up to closet and put his hand on the handle. "Are you—"

"Don't!" Romo cried from within. "Don't open it. I can't bear for you to see."

"What is wrong with him?" Caprica asked.

"He does this sometimes," Gaius murmured. He cleared his throat. "Romo, I was just coming by to confirm my standing order for tomorrow afternoon's activities."

Gaius had ordered twenty-six gallons of Kraft macaroni and cheese be made and placed into two baby pools for what he was sure would be the crowning event achievement of the cruise: Bikini Macaroni Wrestling.

"Sir, I am afraid I cannot fulfill your request." Gaius then was subject to a longer-than-necessary stint of sobbing and what sounded like Romo pounding something. "The captain gave those frakkin' pirates every last box. My shelves are empty. My soul …"

"Is empty. I get it. Drat," Gaius said with a heaving sigh, aggravated beyond belief. 

"Why would the pirates want macaroni and cheese?" Caprica asked. 

_As inquisitive as she is beautiful_ , Gaius thought.

"I don't know!" Romo exclaimed, his voice wavering with frustration. "All I know is that she's sending it over in a crate with a pepper spray bomb to create a distraction so that Bartender Bill can attach limpet mines to the bottom of the ship and blow it up."

"Sweet Asses of Kobol," Gaius said. He looked at Caprica, who looked nothing short of stunned. "I have to tell Laura."

"Don't tell Laura!" Romo cried. "My shame."

"I must," Gaius said. "Tomorrow's afternoon activities will be canceled and she'll need to know why."

Gaius and Caprica walked away from the weeping chef. "I apologize, love, but I'm going to have to delay our rendezvous tonight until I get in contact with Laura and tell her what's happening."

Caprica put her arm around his waist, slowing him down for a long, lingering kiss. Their lips parted and he stroked her arm. "I am sorry."

"It's fine, Gaius," she said, pressing her lips against his forehead. "There's something I need to do tonight."

Gaius immediately felt jealous. Of course he wasn't the only one—a beautiful woman like her. "Are you seeing someone else?" he asked, kissing the ridge of her defined jawline.

"Yes, but not for what you think." She held him tightly for a moment longer, then pulled away with a smile that he could only interpret as sad.

As she walked away, he wondered if he would see her later. Tonight was going down the shitter faster than a seven dollar whore in a hurry. Whistling, he walked to the crew elevator and took it down to the third level of the ship. He strolled to Laura's door and knocked. There was no answer, which he found entirely puzzling as Laura had no social life. Perhaps she had passed out, yet another night off victimized by her bottle habit. He tried to ignore her little problem and was in constant amazement of how it never seemed to impact her professional life. She was always polished on the job, always perfect.

After another hard knock, Gaius pulled out a bar receipt and a pen from his pocket and scribbled a hasty note to her. He slipped the note into the small slot behind her cabin room number, hoping she'd get it whenever she arrived back at her room.

Perhaps he'd go to the hot tub by himself; maybe he'd find another lady, though he knew he'd never find one as sexy as the lovely Caprica. Maybe he didn't want to find another. Maybe she was all he ever needed.

Maybe Gaius Baltar, Love Doctor was incurably in love.

*

Laura returned to her room after her date with Bill, her body humming with satisfaction but her mind whirring with the possibilities behind his need to be gone so quickly after they'd been together. He had so many secrets. She did too, but she was becoming increasingly tired of keeping them and of knowing only peripheral facts about the man who kept stunning her, night after night.

Tonight she'd felt something real. It was time to stop avoiding it, as frightening as the potential attachment seemed. 

Laura noticed a small piece of paper tucked into her mail slot and pulled it out. A familiar chicken scratch.

"Bill … boring Pilates stripper … and …" She tried reading it again, squinting her eyes.

_Bill blowing up pirate ship and all Kraft macaroni for afternoon program. Will post a sign._

"Oh, shit," Laura breathed, dropping the note and racing down the hallway.

*

Bill stood on the deck of the cargo hold, barefoot, his body snugly wrapped in the black wetsuit. He looked down again, surprised to see how much weight he'd lost. There was a silver lining to everything. 

"You ready?" Ellen asked him.

Bill slung his spear gun over his shoulder. He had a frakking spear gun. He never thought he'd see the day.

"Ready as I'll ever be."

Ellen turned to him, a rare serious look on her face. "No heroics, okay? Just get the job done and get out."

"Yes, ma'am." He was surprised to see a tear roll down her cheek. He swiped it away with his thumb. "Thank you for this."

She nodded and gave him a teary smile. 

"Hey, no tears. In the worst case I'll just go out with a bang instead of a whimper."

When she didn't have a snappy comeback, he leaned in and kissed her gently on the lips. Pulling away, he swept his eyes across the deck one last time and caught sight of Laura standing with the crewmen waiting to oversee the launch. 

The expression on her face was a mix of fury and disappointment. He grinned at her misunderstanding and that only made her madder. She turned to storm out of the hold, but he sprinted after her and caught her just inside the doorway. He set down his spear gun. 

"Hey," he said, spinning her around and pulling her into his arms. "C'mere."

"Frak—" 

He didn't have time to explain so he let his body do the talking, capturing her mouth in a bruising kiss while his arms pulled her close. Someone let out a wolf whistle but Bill only deepened the kiss, tangling his hands in Laura's hair as her arms came around him in a crushing hug. 

Frankly, he didn't care who was watching. There was a chance he wouldn't come back from this mission and he wasn't going to leave Laura behind, wondering how he felt about her. 

When he finally pulled away, they stared at each other for a moment, panting. 

"Have a safe … mission," she said, her palm cupping his cheek. 

"You're supposed to say 'good hunting.'"

"Mmmmm." Now she was getting all teary-eyed too. 

Bill sighed and stepped back. "I have to go."

She nodded, wrapping her arms around her body. "Go."

Slinging his spear gun over his back, he turned toward the open bay of the hold where the launch was waiting. One last mission. One last chance to prove himself.

*

Ellen was to detonate the bomb in the crate in exactly five minutes and ring him on the wall phone so he could enter the water amid the distraction. He was sitting alongside a receiving port aft with a rope ladder at the ready for his eventual ascent back into _Galactica_. Heart racing, thoughts of whether or not his body could handle what he was about to do threatened to disable his confidence. There was no _if_ he could do it.

He had to do it.

The limpet mines were heavy in the pack on his stomach; easy access was imperative. He'd only have a short time—a matter of minutes, to play it safe—to plant them on the pirates' ship undetected. Then his plan was to high-tail it back home within the ten-minute countdown to limpet mine detonation.

Something like this was old hat to him by now. He just hadn't done anything like it in the past twenty years.

Three minutes to go before he expected Ellen's cue. To keep his confidence from wavering he began to think about Laura. He'd told her nothing of the mission but somehow she'd found out about it. Thoughts of their kiss calmed him and actually enlivened his senses. Everything was so quiet, but he could hear the gentle knocking of waves against metal, beckoning him in. They were dangerously seductive, reminiscent of his first night on the ship, the first time Laura had touched his hand. It seemed like a lifetime ago for a man who had lived many lives.

As much as he was doing this for the ship, he was doing this for her.

He picked up the ringing phone.

"Husker, this is Bobcat. Do you copy?"

Bill smiled at Ellen's use of their old call signs. "Husker here."

"Whaddya hear?"

He listened, watching the darkened form of the pirate ship for activity. "Nothin' but the waves."

"Then good hunting. We'll see you back soon."

Bill hung up, then put on his night-vision diving mask. He adjusted his regulator, checked his tank, and then toed up to the edge with his flippers. Inflating his BCD, he eyed the water's surface, then looked up and closed his eyes.

He stepped off the edge, the feeling of free fall sending his adrenaline soaring by the time he hit the chilly depths below.

Shaking off the initial shock of impact and temperature, he adjusted his BCD and descended below the surface, then took off in a fast swim to the pirate's ship, one hundred yards away and unsuspecting of his arrival.

*

Ellen watched anxiously from _Galactica_ 's bridge, expecting a reaction from the pirate ship in retaliation for the pepper spray bomb. But so far there was nothing, not even an evac onto the decks, which was entirely disheartening.

"What's going on?" Laura joined her to peer out the window at the darkened ship.

"Not much of anything," Ellen said. "And that's what worries me."

Suddenly, light flooded the pirate's bridge. "The lights are on … but is anybody home?" Ellen murmured, taking out her binoculars and bringing them to her eyes.

Ear-splitting white noise came over the wireless , followed by silence and then a voice.

"Captain Tigh, are you there?"

It was John, the pirate captain. She picked up the handset. "Tigh speaking. Over."

"We wanted to thank you for the macaroni and cheese," John said. Ellen immediately felt the hair bristle at the back of her neck. Something wasn't right. "Next time, hold the pepper."

"Frak," Ellen growled, tight fisted.

"Before we indulge in our spoils—which, rest assured, will be a lot more than boxed pasta—I'd like to use this opportunity to try out something I've developed. Counterterrorism measures, I call them. Look down to the water."

Ellen's brow furrowed, her mouth dry, as she followed his instructions.

Beneath the surface, she instantly saw them.

"Raider sharks."

*

Bill estimated he was nearly halfway to the pirate ship and kicking ass when he began to hear muted gunfire from the air above. There were bright flashes that indicated something more was going on than a nightly fireworks show off the starboard bow.

He began swimming faster when he saw a glint of red out of the corner of his eye.

He came to a halt and turned to look, squinting through the dark water. It was definitely a red light, traveling back and forth along a line, on the front of a … something that took the form of a shark.

From around the back of the pirate ship came another, then another.

Somehow the pirates had found out about the mission and employed a counterattack.

Bill froze, one hand on his spear gun—he didn't know what they were, if they had ammunition, or if they could be disabled by something as low tech as a spear. They were swimming slowly toward him, circling each other and then gathering in a triangle formation, those red lights hypnotic.

And they were getting too close.

*

"Gaeta!" Ellen yelled. "Action stations. Condition one. Activate the point defense guns and main batteries."

"Action stations, Action stations. Set condition one throughout the ship." Gaeta barely got his announcement out before they heard, and felt, the first heavy artillery hit _Galactica_. Then he looked over his shoulder and Ellen braced for whatever terrible revelation he was about to make with that apologetic doe-eyed look of his. "Captain, cruise ships don't have point defense guns and main batteries."

"What the _shit_!" Ellen roared. "How did I not know this? Do we have any armament? Anything whatsoever?"

"Stock weapons … grenades, um, about two dozen machine guns …"

"Enough with the frakkin' laundry list! I need _you_ "—Ellen pointed at Saul—"to take Sam, Agathon and _whoever the frak can hold a gun_ to the bow and rain fire on these motherfrakkers."

"Guns're too small and we ain't got enough," Saul said. "Be like throwing pebbles at ‘em."

 _Galactica_ rattled with incoming fire.

"What about Bill?" Laura asked.

"Yeah, he's in a world of shit." Ellen gritted her teeth and slammed the handset down to the floor. "A world of shit."

Laura turned to Ellen, who in an instant knew she would regret letting Laura on the bridge. "What do you mean, 'a world of shit?' You have to do something! You got him into this, now get him out!"

"Bill can save himself," Ellen said, another round of artillery booming. "If he wants to, he will."

"I can't believe this! Can't we just give them the people they want? Five people, right?" Laura was gesticulating wildly and it would have been amusing if Ellen weren't a party to her ship being sunk at that very moment. "Five _frakkin'_ people and we avoid all this. Hand them over, we'll escape and alert authorities then we'll get them back."

"You, my dear, have no idea how the high seas work." Ellen looked her straight in the eye. This bitch was on her last nerve. "I'm going to advise you to shut the frak up before I throw you in the brig. And trust me, that is not the place you want to be if and when this ship goes down."

Suddenly _Galactica_ made a terrifying groaning sound and was rocked by a powerful explosion. Laura fell into Ellen and clutched at her arms, trying to stay upright. Ellen closed her eyes. She estimated, from the point of impact, that they'd taken out the main engine room and that there was a hole where there used to be solid steel.

It was only a matter of an hour at best before this ship would be sleeping with the fish.

Also, Laura Roslin smelled really good, she thought.

"Unbelievable!" Laura scrambled to regain her balance and pushed Ellen away. "We should … we can't stand for this! I mean, isn't this what mutinies are for?"

"Don't look at me," Gaeta said, turning back around.

Ellen kept a steady eye on Laura. "Why don't _you_ get to the passenger levels and help coordinate the lifeboat efforts. Because we are going to need to evacuate this ship and fast. We're wasting precious time. You need to do your job."

Laura stared angrily at Ellen, then whipped around and stormed away, slamming the bridge door behind her. 

"What he sees in her, I do not know." Ellen adjusted her captain's hat and bent over the control board.

Gaeta cleared his throat. "Just a question, sir … why aren't we taking off instead of taking fire? Give it our all? Maybe if we got far enough away from them, our nav systems would come back online."

"I'm not leaving a man behind," Ellen said. "That's not what you do. Ever."

Ellen listened to the barrage of ammunition hitting the side of her ship and closed her eyes.

"Get me Lee Adama."

*

Bill had jettisoned the limpet mines and started swimming back to _Galactica_ as fast as he could but he knew he couldn't outswim the mechanical sharks coming straight for him. _At least they move slowly_ , he thought. 

He estimated he had about ten yards left when he had to turn around because the first shark was right on him. He whipped out his spear gun and aimed it right at the red light, shooting the shark between the eyes. After the pneumatic thunk of the spear being shot, there was a terrible, screeching noise as the point of it tore through the metal from one side of the shark to the other. The shark began to sink to the ocean floor, carrying the spear with it. The next shark came up quickly and Bill jammed the spear gun into its mouth as far as it would go. Its teeth grazed his forearm, tearing through his wetsuit and sending a lightning bolt of pain up his arm.

He hoped these sharks weren't drawn to the scent of blood like the ones he'd encountered in the sea off the coast of Mazatlan.

Bill quickly spun around, looking for the other shark. Its red light was farther in the distance—perhaps it had retreated when the others had been disabled. He released his weight belt and dropped it to the ocean floor, ascending to the surface as fast as he could. 

He realized it was too fast too late.

When he hit the surface the sound of gunfire wracked his ears, ten times louder than what he'd heard underwater. _Galactica_ was under heavy fire and he was horrified to see that the back of the ship was beginning to tilt downward. It had several holes in the hull which seemed to be ablaze. But he had more serious problems to deal with. He was gasping for breath and kicking himself for it as he began to see black around the edges of his eyes.

_"Mostly all I see are stars … more than I ever imagined. Never ceases to amaze me."_

He saw them then. Hundreds. Millions.

There was a roar in his head when he closed his eyes.

*

Lee was napping in one of the soft faux-leather benches nestled in the bow of _Pegasus_ when the first shot hit the ship. He'd taken fire before; he didn't need to radio up to the bridge to confirm that they were being shelled.

He was cranking the overhead door to the launch bay open when the phone rang. Ripping it off the wall, he pinned it between his ear and shoulder so he could keep working the door crank. "Yeah?"

Gaeta's voice came over the line. "I have the captain for you."

"I'm kinda busy down here."

"You're about to be busier," the captain said. She sounded panicked, something Lee hadn't thought possible. "I need you to take out the pirate ship. Right frakking now."

"With what exactly?" 

With the launch door finally open, he found himself looking out into a sea of fire. The ship was leaning aft badly and the pirates had a whole battery of guns running wide open as they bore down on _Galactica_.

" _Pegasus_. That overpriced toy is the closest thing we have to a ballistic weapon."

"You've got to be frakking kidding me. That's a two-million-dollar boat you're talking about."

"And it's about to be sitting on the bottom of the ocean—along with your father—if we don't do something fast to halt this attack."

"My father?"

"He's in the water somewhere between _Galactica_ and the enemy vessel—"

Lee dropped the phone, letting it swing on its cord. It figured, his father in the thick of the battle, even at his age. _Frakkin' bartender, my ass._ He had no idea how his father factored into this mess, but if his past was any indication, Bill Adama was probably the one who'd thought up this crazy plan in the first place. 

Firing up the forklift, Lee made quick work of loading the passenger area of the boat with drums of fuel, everything he felt he could safely carry without sinking her, and then he was in the water. 

Without even a glance back at _Galactica_ , he opened the throttle, gunning the boat into the tachometer's red zone. He made a wide circle out away from the pirate boat to gain speed and then pointed _Pegasus _'s nose straight at the sinister black ship. Using some lifejackets and the emergency anchor, he rigged up the controls to ensure that she would ram dead center into the other boat's hull.__

__As the pirate ship grew larger and larger in front of him, Lee quickly scanned the water for human forms. There, bobbing in the water, about ten yards off _Galactica_ 's bow. It looked like a head and shoulders above the water, but they were disturbingly limp. Just seconds before impact, Lee dove off the back of his beloved speedboat and into the churning waves._ _

__He didn't bother looking back to see the collision. The explosion lit the water as the fireball climbed high into the sky. He plunged under the water, diving hard to avoid the fiery debris raining on the ocean's surface._ _

___Pegasus_ was gone, her life given in the line of duty, but Lee's mind was on only one thing. Surfacing about fifty yards from where he'd gone under, he started stroking hard. The debris in the water made it difficult to pick out what he'd thought was a person before, but he'd made tougher rescues than this. _ _

__If his father was in the water, he'd save the old man. Even if it was the last thing he did._ _

__*_ _

___Bill had looked out the window as the doctor told him. A year to live, on the outside. They sometimes saw this condition in servicemen, especially those who had served time at sea. Sir, you should have been briefed about the risks and been told to have routine x-rays._ _ _

___He was told. He hadn't had them. He had no reason or excuse as to why._ _ _

___A year never seemed like a lot of time before. He'd done year-long stints overseas that felt like a few days._ _ _

___When a year was the span of the rest of your given life, it suddenly seemed a lot more precious than that._ _ _

___It felt like the right thing to do—forgo treatment and flee into the arms of his one true love: a ship._ _ _

___It was the only place he ever felt like he belonged._ _ _

__*_ _

__Laura was busy loading passengers into lifeboats when the blast from the _Pegasus_ 's impact on the pirate ship lit up the sky, sending a wall of heat toward _Galactica_ that knocked everybody to the ground._ _

__"It's okay, it's okay," she said to the weeping passengers around her after she caught her breath. Rising up, she saw the burning wreckage of the other ship, nausea washing over her._ _

___Bill._ He was somewhere out there amid the flames. _Please, let him be out there still._ _ _

__Overcome by nausea and panic, she leaned over the railing and threw up._ _

__Someone cursed loudly from the deck below._ _

__Regaining her composure, she stood and scanned the water. In the glow of the fires, she saw a dark form swimming toward _Galactica_._ _

__"He's alive! Throw him a frakkin' life preserver!"_ _

__In answer to the faint call, seven life preservers flew off various decks of the ship. Laura ran to the stairs, making her way down to the receiving level as quickly as possible._ _

__The caustic smell of burning wood, plastic, and hot metal nearly made her vomit again. There was smoke lingering in the room and a large hole was carved into the ship, jagged teeth where a projectile had ripped through the steel. She was met by Ellen, Saul, and Sam, who were dragging a large net to the open door. They tossed it out. They were joined by the ship's physician, Doc Cottle, a weathered, older man who was never seen without his lab coat that matched his shock of white hair._ _

__"We're going to have to haul his body up." Ellen readied the pulley attached to the net. "Our transmission lines are unscrambled now. Gaeta called in an S.O.S. and we should rendezvous with the Coast Guard within the next half hour. They're sending air-sea rescue and a boat for the transfer of passengers." She pulled hard on the rope, making it tight. " _Galactica_ 's entirely disabled and Lords know when it'll go down."_ _

__"The old girl fought hard." Saul sounded wistful, as emotional as Laura had ever heard him._ _

__"Is he hurt?" Laura asked, trying to peer over the edge of the door._ _

__Saul pushed her back, albeit gently. "We'll have to see. But he's alive, the stubborn bastard."_ _

__Pressing her fingers against her lips, she held back tears as the pulley lurched and began to hum. It was an agonizing collection of seconds until the net appeared, Bill's motionless body tucked within._ _

__"Oh, my Gods." Laura nearly sprang forward but Sam grabbed her arm and held her back. The doctor and Ellen rushed over to the net. Ellen was repeating Bill's name as they freed him from the ropes while Cottle examined his airway, then checked for breath and finally a pulse._ _

__"Too weak. He's too cold," the doctor said gruffly, ripping open his bag and quickly winding gauze around a blood-mottled gash in the arm of Bill's wetsuit. "Quickly, the warming blanket. Sam, we're going to need your muscle on this."_ _

__"Stay here." Sam's message to her was quiet but firm. Her tears began to fall as she watched them place Bill on a rescue backboard atop the warming blankets. They wrapped the reflective sheet and thick wool blanket over him and tightened the board's straps across his body, leaving one arm free. Still unmoving, with his eyes closed and his face pallid, he looked dead already._ _

__Lee emerged, having climbed up the rope ladder, soaked and breathing hard. Ellen grabbed another reflective sheet and tossed it to him. He quickly wrapped it around himself but it didn't disguise the shivers tremoring through his body._ _

__"You damn well saved us all, son," Cottle said, not looking up as he pulled out a bag of solution and readied a needle. He punctured the top of Bill's hand and held up the bag._ _

__Lee walked over to his father and kneeled down. "I hope so."_ _

__Bill coughed violently, a wet, harsh bark that took too long to subside._ _

__Laura recognized the sound and the tremors that went along with it; it had just been such a long time._ _

__"Laura."_ _

__Laura snapped back to attention and heard Ellen call her name. "Can you watch over Bill until the rescue team arrives? Cottle will oversee his vitals. I've got a hundred fires to put out. Literally."_ _

__Laura nodded, then walked up to the backboard and kneeled across from Lee. A few moments of silence passed and Lee got up and made his way to the door. Laura wondered what kind of relationship the two of them had—they'd never discussed it._ _

__Cottle, still holding the rehydration bag up, looked as grim as she felt._ _

__She didn't know what to say; instead, she stroked Bill's cheek, alarmed at the chill it brought to her fingertips. The breaths he took were raspy and labored. Giving up on holding back her tears, she left one hand on his face as the other wiped them away._ _

__It'd been so long since she'd lost it._ _

__"How is he?" She managed to choke this out despite the tightening of her throat._ _

__"He's in terrible shape. Likely he'll get pneumonia. And with his condition, that's a real turn for the worse."_ _

__Laura looked at the doctor, who was again checking Bill's pulse. "Condition?" The regret on Cottle's face was palpable and Laura pressed on. "Is there another condition?"_ _

__"You're not his next of kin."_ _

__Laura heard the faint whirring of a chopper in the distance. "I'm not, but … I'm one of the only people he has and I need to know. He would want me to know."_ _

__"Then why didn't he tell you?"_ _

__There were so many reasons. "You have to tell me now. And I'm going with him."_ _

__Everything was moving so quickly. She barely realized what she was saying, but she knew what she was saying was right. He would want her to know; he would want her by his side._ _

__Cottle looked down for several precious seconds and Laura wanted to reach over and grab his lapels and shake him until he told her the truth. The sound of the helicopter grew louder and she knew they'd soon have no chance._ _

__"I love him, just tell me, please." It all came out on a breath, a Hail Mary pass._ _

___For the love of the Gods._ _ _

__The doctor looked up at her. "He has cancer. Mesothelioma. Stage four."_ _

__Laura felt lightheaded, instantly, like she'd just taken a hit of something. "What?"_ _

__"You heard me."_ _

__"No. How do you know? You don't know."_ _

__"I have medical records. I've been coordinating his care with his hospice physicians. This ship was how he was going to sail off gloriously into the sunset." Cottle put his hand on Bill's chest. "And he did, in a way."_ _

__"Oh, Bill, why didn't you—frak, why didn't you tell me." Everything was so utterly frakked. She'd known they'd both kept secrets, but the fact that he was dying … she should have realized something was wrong. That night at the pool when he was tired and elusive, the night over the bar when he had to stop. There were signs. She hadn't been able to connect the dots._ _

__Bill's eyelids fluttered. Her breath caught in her throat as she leaned closer._ _

__"Bill? Bill, it's me. Can you hear me?" She cupped his face and kissed his forehead. "Come on," she whispered against his skin._ _

___Just a little more time._ _ _

__"Here again." His voice was hoarse and barely audible._ _

__"You didn't die. We're getting you to a hospital." Laura couldn't find enough ways to touch him now, wanting so desperately to be closer but unable to find a way. He had cancer. Gods damn everything._ _

__Bill struggled to swallow, going into another coughing fit. Tears sprang into Laura's eyes again. She was useless at the moment and she hated it. His heaving chest subsided and he finally opened his eyes, bloodshot red that clashed with the blue of his irises._ _

__"I saw light. A mountain." He winced, squeezing his eyes shut. "Other things."_ _

__Both of her hands went to his face. "Shhh. You're here. You're here now."_ _

__His smile was faint. "I saw you. A ship in the stars and again. Later."_ _

__"He's hallucinating." The old doctor joined Lee to peer out the door and she could feel the spray that the helicopter's rotors were whipping up off the ocean's surface. Laura's tears fell upon Bill's cheeks and she shook her head, pressing her lips against his ear._ _

__"We were never strangers, Bill. I knew it."_ _

__*_ _

__The helicopter ride to the hospital was a blur for Laura. Too much was happening too quickly; she was still reeling from Cottle's revelation. She barely heard the clamor both times Bill stopped breathing—the shouting, Lee's concern, medical terms and phrases Laura didn't, and didn't want to, understand. All she wanted to hear was his voice._ _

__She ached to touch him, and finally, in the last few minutes before they landed on the mainland, there was a stillness in which she was able to hold his hand._ _

__They'd never held hands before and she didn't let go until someone pulled her hand away._ _

__She thought she must be in shock, drunk on pain, a pain so deep she couldn't feel it--but she knew it was there. Her head light, she followed the medics and Bill, on a gurney, into the hospital. The lights were too bright for eyes so dry._ _

__She was stopped at the entrance to the treatment rooms by someone who kept repeating the same words, trying to get a response._ _

__"Are you immediate family?"_ _

__Laura bit down on her lip, tasting a tinge of blood. She felt a hand on her back._ _

__"She's his wife."_ _

__She looked over at Cottle, who was glaring at the nurse. "Let's go," he said more gently, taking her arm._ _

__*_ _

__Lee paced nervously in the hallway of the ER. _Cancer._ Was that was his father wanted to talk to him about? _ _

__Suddenly all of the things they'd argued about over the years seemed so petty and unimportant. So much lost time …_ _

__Lee wiped the tears from his eyes and sniffled, feeling like a child again. He was surprised at the touch of a hand on his elbow._ _

__"Are you okay?"_ _

__It was Laura. "Oh, yeah, I guess. I mean, obviously not, but …"_ _

__"I know." Her voice was as gentle as the touch of her hand on his arm. "It's a lot to process."_ _

__"Yeah." He sniffed again, trying to compose himself._ _

__Laura murmured something reassuring and drifted away. Other people were milling around now, starting to arrive from the ship. He spotted the Tighs, the captain's white uniform stained with evidence of the battle._ _

__Time seemed to pass haphazardly. Too fast and then too slow as he waited for word from the doctors. Finally someone came out to tell him that they were moving his father upstairs to the Medical ICU._ _

__A group of people in hospital garb emerged through the swinging doors, flanking a stretcher. Lee could only see his dad's head. There was an oxygen tube placed below his nose but he was breathing on his own. That was a good sign, he knew._ _

__He was about to follow the stretcher upstairs with Laura when he spotted Kara racing through the halls. She hit him at a dead run, throwing her arms around him and knocking him back several steps._ _

__"I got here as fast as I could," she said, sobbing._ _

__Holding her close, he buried his face in her hair. She smelled like the ocean._ _

__*_ _

__Ellen hated hospitals. It was a cliché, she knew, but when you'd died in as many of them as she had, it was a well-earned hatred._ _

__She and Saul found Doc Cottle near the elevator, looking grave._ _

__"Just a matter of time now," he said._ _

__Saul squeezed Ellen's hand. "Does he know?"_ _

__"I gave him the short version but I think he knew already. He's been in and out of consciousness."_ _

__"I just need a few minutes with him," Ellen said. "I need to say goodbye."_ _

__The same nurse who stopped Laura earlier eyed Ellen and Cottle as they approached her._ _

__"Younger sister," Cottle said._ _

__With a roll of her eyes, the nurse issued Ellen a visitor's pass for the MICU._ _

__"You flatter me," Ellen whispered as they rode the elevator up four floors._ _

__The MICU pod was small and circular, allowing Ellen to see into Bill's room as she stepped off the elevator. Laura Roslin was in there with him, sitting next to his bed, all tragedy and lost hope._ _

__Ellen steeled herself for her task and strode into the room like she owned it. "You weren't kidding about going out with a bang."_ _

__Bill's eyes fluttered open at the sound of her voice. They looked unfocused. His breathing was shallow and slow. But he managed to raise his hand off the bed a few inches as recognition set in. She set the bag she'd brought him on the chair and took his outstretched fingers in hers and was startled by how cold they were. His fingernails were blue around the edges. Probably the morphine slowing down his circulation._ _

__Standing on the opposite side of the bed, Ellen avoided Laura's teary gaze—the last thing Bill needed was two women crying over him. Again. Instead, she focused on the man who lay in the bed, the man who'd sacrificed his life because she'd asked him to._ _

__His lips moved and she had to bend down to hear what he was trying to say._ _

__"—mission?"_ _

__She squeezed his hand gently. "You did it, Bill. Defeated the pirates, protected the assets. You really kicked ass out there today. Made us all proud."_ _

__She left out the rest … the massive rescue efforts, the dozens of civilian casualties, the summary dismissal of her entire crew, and the loss of _Galactica_ to Davey Jones's Locker. There were some things a dying man didn't need to know. _ _

__Laura looked up at her and smiled tearily, obviously grateful for Ellen's discretion._ _

__"How 'bout you?" Bill whispered._ _

__"Me? You know me. I'll be fine. I've got a job lined up on a Russian icebreaker and they've agreed to take on most of the core crew members. We'll be in Vladivostok by daybreak." With new identities. Again. At least the pirates hadn't blown her secret. It wasn't time for the identities of the five to be revealed in this iteration._ _

__Bill nodded almost imperceptibly. "Kotsov. You know …"_ _

__"That bastard. Kiev, right?" She tried to keep it light, keep him from wasting too much energy worrying about her. "If I need anything, I'll look him up. Tell him you said to go frak himself, too. How's that?"_ _

__With a weak smile, Bill closed his eyes._ _

__Laura had started crying softly. Obviously she was in love with Bill. Seriously, head-over-heels in love with him. Not one to question love at first sight—she'd been with Saul frakking Tigh for how many centuries now—Ellen knew it was time to take her leave._ _

__She bent down and smoothed Bill's hair back. He was burning up. He'd be lucky to last the night. Pressing a kiss to his forehead, she fought hard against the sob that was threatening to break through her icy captain's demeanor. "Go with the Gods, Bill."_ _

__Before he could respond, she turned and fled the room. She didn't want him to see her cry._ _

__Saul was there waiting for her when the elevator opened on the ground floor and she crumpled in his arms, muffling her sobs against the heavy wool of his pea coat._ _

__*_ _

__Laura had taken a break from her vigil, leaving Lee to speak what might be his final words with his father while she roamed sterile halls. She didn't want to wait too long before she returned, but knew that Lee deserved to give his father his last respects._ _

__She hadn't given herself time to cope with the idea that Bill had cancer, that he was dying. It seemed to be happening so quickly even though she knew it had probably been happening for years, for plenty of time before she knew him. He'd had time to prepare for this moment, and knowing Bill—as little as she did—he had probably spent ample time preparing._ _

__She was a planner and this was not in her plan. None of it had been—meeting him, falling in love, all the shit that happened afterward._ _

__It seemed that death liked the sneak attack. Every time she encountered it in her life it was by surprise, within an instant taking away the ones she loved. She always needed more time. Life was fragile and unpredictable, and now, as much as she wished that the loss of Bill were under her control, it wasn't._ _

__Very few things were._ _

__With him she had felt highs and lows of emotion that she had rarely let herself feel since the death of her father and sisters. She'd spent a lot of time and gone through a lot of bottles to try and numb those down, to keep herself steady. Maybe she should stop fighting so hard against all the pain and give herself over to it. Because with that pain, she realized now, also came the potential for ecstasy. For love._ _

__It's what Bill would want. But he would want her to make that decision herself._ _

__Left with only hours to both come to terms with Bill's illness and to ready herself for a last goodbye, she now felt broken. Not irreparably broken—not the wailing, self-pitying kind of broken. This was not how Laura ever broke, for she'd broken before. More like someone had hit a homerun through her stained-glass window. Colors everywhere._ _

__She would mourn, gather up the pieces, and move on, but always remember that beauty._ _

__The smell of the cafeteria made her gag and served to quell her growling stomach. She returned to Bill's room in the MICU and Lee stood up, squeezing his father's hand as he rose._ _

__"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to—"_ _

__"It's all right." Lee walked over to her and gave her a hug. Unexpected, though welcome, she let him embrace her and tried to maintain her composure. "Take care of him for me," Lee whispered in her ear._ _

__Nodding, she let go of Bill's son and watched the door click quietly shut behind him._ _

__As Laura walked to Bill's bedside, she found herself parsing thoughts in her head, placing them into categories of importance. What mattered now, what didn't. What he needed to hear, what she needed to say._ _

__He didn't look drained, as he had in the past hours. He looked energized, if that was possible. Like he'd somehow found a second wind. "I'm sorry I never told you."_ _

__Laura felt a twinge of heartache at this man, with his entire adventurous life behind him, feeling regret over such a thing at such a moment._ _

__"Don't be sorry. About anything."_ _

__"A rare reprieve from guilt." He smiled. "I'll take it."_ _

__She smiled then, though hers was through tears. "Is there anything you need me to do?"_ _

__After a moment of quiet contemplation, he spoke. "Two things."_ _

__"Okay."_ _

__"Tell me you love me."_ _

__She wiped her cheek with the back of her shaking hand. "I did already, on the ship. You didn't hear?"_ _

__"One more time."_ _

__Her laugh felt misplaced but she couldn't stop it. "I love you."_ _

__Bill cupped her hand in his palm and squeezed it. "I love you, too."_ _

__Laura tried to hold back the swell of anger over their ill timing. There would be time for that later. She would grieve her losses when he was gone, not now, not while he was still here beside her. "The second thing?"_ _

__"In the bag that Ellen brought me you'll find a book. I'd like you to read it to me."_ _

__Walking over to the bag on the small table across the room, for the first time Laura was overcome by the depth of Bill's friendship with Ellen. She felt no jealousy or distrust now, merely a sense of envy that the other woman had been given the opportunity to spend so many more years with him. These were adventures she wished they could have, but their adventure had been cut short._ _

__She unzipped his bag, then opened it. The book was easy to find, but it wasn't what caught her eye._ _

__Laura picked up his book and pulled a larger paperback book from between two shirts. As she walked back to his bedside she gritted her teeth to hold back what tears were threatening to come forth._ _

__She placed Bill's scrapbook on his chest. He smiled and traced the paper dolls pasted on front with his fingertips. "You found it."_ _

__"We never finished it."_ _

__He took her hand in his, so cold. "Maybe next time."_ _

__Somewhere in her heart she knew what he meant and that peace stilled the pain swelling within her._ _

__Laura opened the old leather-bound book in her lap and a wrapped condom dropped out. "Always prepared, huh?"_ _

__His laugh became a cough, which slowly settled. "Rather be doing that."_ _

__She slipped it in her pocket before anyone could see. "Me too."_ _

__Turning to the title page, she hesitated, then looked up at him._ _

__"'The Old Man and the Sea,'" she whispered. "How fitting."_ _

__"I'm near the end."_ _

__"I see."_ _

__"I never finished. I wasn't ready for it to end."_ _

__"Are you ready now?"_ _

__He reached up and touched her face. "Yes."_ _

__Laura brushed her lips across his fingers, placing his hand at rest on his chest. Settling into the chair by his side, she swallowed the lump in her throat. She opened to the worn leather bookmark, just a few pages from the end, and began to read._ _

__"'He no longer dreamed of storms, nor of women, nor of great occurrences, nor of great fish, nor fights, nor contests of strength, nor of his wife. He only dreamed of places now and of the lions on the beach. They played like young cats in the dusk and he loved them as he loved the boy.'"_ _

__Shallow breaths were all she could hear. She recalled, and regretted, how afraid she was to look at her mother in her last moments. Glancing at him, he looked peaceful, finally at peace, his eyes closed. She continued on, more hurried now, a race to the end._ _

__The last words she had memorized; this book she had loved when young and had read dozens of times, though not in the recent past. Softly reciting them, she raised her eyes to find no evidence of breath, no register of heartbeat._ _

__She left one last message against his forehead, hoping he would somehow hear it._ _

__"Sleep well old man."_ _

__THE END_ _


End file.
